Working for the Enemy
by Kaisu
Summary: A rolling plot based romance. Betrayals of loyalty and misunderstanding create a dynamic atmosphere of unprecedented attraction between Soundwave and a young human. SW/OC
1. Abduction

_Hi readers! I'm excited because Soundwave/human fics are rare. He's my new interest from TF Prime. I mean, G1- present Soundwave has been great and all but to my own preferences he's gotten progressively worse. But TF Prime totally rectified themselves with this Soundwave, he's amazingly bad ass! The first few chapters are an unfolding plot and purpose. It's a delicate balance because Soundwave is hard to depict immediately and I fear an OOC Soundwave... so things are happening slowly at first. But immerse yourself! Later chapters to be a LOT more interesting and...involved... cuz that's what I do!-K ;)  
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Ch 1: Abduction_  
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"Soundwave..."

A buzz and footsteps shuffled across the bridge. Megatron stood next to the bag that held the human. Soundwave approached his master delicately, as always. He nodded and kneeled before him.

"We've got our delivery, as scheduled. Get it started immediately with no waste. In a short time we will ascertain if it is a suitable candidate for our own purpose. Your duty with this filthy human is to see if it can be used for our advantage. They searched the globe for the best one, and so, behold." He lifted the bag and dumped out the human, her hands bound behind her back with a white cord and her feet bound with the same cord. Her lip looked busted but otherwise she looked in good shape. Soundwave lowered his head to look her over, she didn't look as smart as they had said, but so she was.

"Take her to the gateway room and get her situated, everything should have already been provided for her survival when 'they' came. If the Autobots can employ the help of their small squishy minions, so can we, even if it IS by the hands of those we don't trust. We will give Mech a mercy try after Cylas's encounter as she didn't come to us willingly." He smirked. Soundwave nodded and scooped up the human in his arms and headed down the corridor.

Kirsten's mouth had been duct taped, by Mech, whom her university professor was working with, little had she known that her University studies would bring her here unforseen.

After the Cybertronians had made their presence known on Earth for all of the humans to see, the research started, the transcriptions began, and science proceeded. She had an affinity for linguistics, and when she had the chance to study the transcriptions and translations of the Cybertronian language under the supervision and apprenticeship of the award-winning liguist and logistics professor at her university, she became his student in hopes that her knowledge and passion would push her further ahead than anyone in the field. And it did. What she didn't know was, he worked for Mech, who had built bonds with the Decepticons. He saw the passion in her and took advantage of it.

When Mech had abducted her it was 2:56 am. They taped her mouth shut first and then bound her hands. Graciously, they sat her down and quickly explained what was about to happen. After listening unwillingly to their proposition she hesitated, she wasn't exactly given an ultimatum so she nodded her head in agreement in fear of a worse outcome. They silently fled from her small apartment at 3 am and she hadn't been out of the bag she had been stuffed into since. The busted lip came from a sharp corner that the Mech vehicle took which slammed her against the side panel.

Her hair bounced loosely on her head with Soundwave's steps until they reached the room she was to be bound to for some length of time.

Her eyes darted around the corridor in fear and amazement, her nostrils flared with each breath and her hands became clammy. A door opened at Soundwave's arrival and he entered. Gently, he put her down on the cold floor and unbound her hands and feet with a small laser from his wrist. She tugged at the loose cords and then rubbed her wrists nursing the small red impressions. She grabbed one end of the duct tape and ripped it off her face. She winced and moaned at the sharp but quick pain. She took a few deep breaths, and started wheezing. The air wasn't suited for her at this level. Though they still floated in the atmosphere, it was thin.

Soundwave made his way to the main computer screen in the room and tapped away. Kirsten kneeled with her hands and knees on the floor trying to get a deep enough breath, then noticed who Soundwave was communicating with, her professor.

"Kirsten! I'm glad you made it, meet Soundwave, your new authority and tutor." His sharp face smiled from the screen, his green eyes glowing mercilessly and his prickly beard giving him a mad scientist like character.

"Soundwave, she may need oxygen at first until her red blood cell count gets higher. I will send some through the ground bridge as necessary. Kirsten, is there anything you need?"

Kirsten turned her head sideways to look at him, startled that he would ask such a question. She needed lots of things! How about a heater, for one, she thought, it was uncomfortably cold.

"Just breathe slowly, the altitude is high. We've tried to make your stay as nice as possible, look behind you and you will find a sofa, a bed and toilet." Kirsten looked around to where he motioned and there was a small twin-sized bed with a blanket, a stiff looking sofa and yes, a toilet. She puffed and heaved and arched her back like a cat while she took in air, but she couldn't make words yet without feeling like she was about to pass out.

"Alright, first things first, let's get you an oxygen tank. Soundwave, please open a ground bridge to us in ten."

Soundwave nodded to the screen and left the room to gather the oxygen from the other humans. Kirsten took the private time to collapse on the floor and roll onto her back. Her arms came up to cover her face and she panted deeply with all of the thoughts going through her head at the moment. Oh god, what did she just agree to do? How will she explain this to her parents? Do her parents even know? Well, they will soon enough, she thought. They'll know something. Probably not the truth.


	2. The Task

Chapter 2: The Task

She was to spend part of her time with the oxygen and part of her time without it so that soon she wouldn't need it. Every little step winded her. Funny, she thought she was in pretty good health, but floating a constant 25,000 ft above sea level could wind even the most powerful athlete. She had a headache, her blood felt slow and she just needed time to adjust. The professor at least convinced Megatron not to let her start on any projects until she had acclimated but he was getting impatient.

"Worthless oxygen breathing inhabitants!" He slammed his fist on the computer, "If I have to wait another day for that small thing to prove herself..." as if on cue, Megatron received a transmission from the professor. Megatron glared at the screen before punching a button, hard. He sneered, "Professor, I take it that your race realizes how absolutely insubstantial it is."

"Lord Megatron, please be patient, she is the best Cybertronian linguist that earth has to offer. Once she gets started, I promise that you won't have her on board the ship for long. Her skills surpass mine because of her ability to express thing so eloquently. Surely you can wait a little more to achieve perfection." The professor said holding up his hands by his head in surrender. Megatron's eyes squinted and his lips curled.

"Soundwave!" Megatron turned to face the room and Soundwave steadily made his way to him. Megatron held up a small disc and Soundwave reached out to receive it. "Tell her to start. I don't care if she feels ill or not, get her started anyway. I grow tired of waiting." Soundwave took the disc and nodded. Megatron turned back to the professor. "She starts now, I WILL keep an eye on her professor. If I find out that she does anything other than the duty she has planned, I will know, and it WILL come back to you." And he cut off the transmission. Afterall, Mech did have a history of betrayals.

Soundwave entered the gateway room and Kirsten's temporary home. She was passed out when Soundwave arrived on her small stiff sofa. He made his presence known with noises from the computer, from himself and she awoke. She removed her oxygen mask from her face and panted a few times without it Soundwave opened the screen to the documents she was to translate, documents on technology for Mech's cybernetic development. That was the agreement. In return, Mech gave the Decepticons the in's and to's of the world's top governments. Mech's members had infiltrated everywhere, all over the world and the Decepticons needed their assistance and cover. Soundwave knew why they grouped with Mech for a short time, hopefully, in order to prepare for the day they betrayed them. There were rumors of U.N. Documents in circulation ordering the annihilation of the Decepticons, submitted by Mech themselves. Soundwave was unable to crack their code though, it was far too random in nature.

Kirsten drowsily opened her eyes to see Soundwave typing away at the massive keyboard in front of him. She had studied that keyboard forever on end, through the nights and she dreamed about it. Now it was here, now it was real. It was very different from her own laptop keyboard, far more symbols and tasks but the same general idea. He turned to peer at her. She caught him looking her way and then she snapped up onto her feet and shook off her sleepiness and stumbled over to him. She decided that it was a good idea not to make him wait. There was a simple platform with simple stairs leading up to the keyboard, she stopped at the bottom of it. She looked up to Soundwave again. He slowly lifted an arm and pointed to the top of the stairs. She said nothing as she climbed the metal stairs, every step clanged in her head, all of her senses were sensitive at this altitude. She was now chest level with him and could now really get a sense of how big he really was. Her height matched his chest length and his amazing body was covered in indigo striations that ran underneath his armor. Even though the majority of the ship had been unfathomably cold, he emitted a warmth so powerful that she had to stop and make sure that it was him, and not the feeling of being faint. Amazing how strikingly similar as races they were, as beings from opposite corners of the universe.

Soundwave also took the opportunity to observe his subordinate. Slender, not bony. Fat percentage about 18%. Silver percentage .04% located in auditory lobes. Titanium percentage 1% located in right radius. Mechanic-artificially straightened teeth. High levels of cutaneous melanin. Hair is medium to medium light spectrum saturation of brown-red with UV processed bleaching. Good blood circulation. Seven proportional heads tall and 20/20 vision. Heavy left brain thermal activity and light sensitive eyes. Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing seemed suspicious to him. Megatron had told him to keep a very close eye on her, just in case Mech tried anything. But so far, she looked like a quintessential college student. The bit of titanium in her arm alarmed him a little bit but upon closer inspection, he found that it was simple titanium plating, that was it. No circuitry or satellite broadcasting abilities or chips implanted. Probably just from an injury at some point.

Soundwave pointed to the chair on the platform which faced a laptop and a smaller computer screen. She remembered a small amount of Mech's ramblings that abduction night and vaguely remembered that small part about 'the Decepticon you will work under will never talk, so don't try.' She would have to figure out a way to communicate somehow with him though, if they were to be working together, kind of. She squinted at the sudden bright light in front of her and tried to read it's symbols. 'I guess this is my first assignment' she thought. She was going to ask him if this was indeed what she thought, and then decided not to. 'So don't even try.' popped into her head again. She sat down in the chair and immediately felt it's discomfort. Metal everything, everything! She mentally prepared herself for her task. She read the Cybertronian symbols and started typing on the laptop.


	3. Testing testing

Chapter 3: Testing testing...

The days were monotonous and a little boring. Kirsten wish she at least had some sort of a window to stare out of when she needed a mental break from typing. She rested her chin in her hand for a second and cleared her mind after 4 hours of continuous typing. The sleep was okay, except for Soundwave, who barged in and out of her room at irregular hours, day or night. After several days, she finally could sleep past his intruding nature and luckily, he never made much noise. This particular third day she tried to work without the use of the oxygen. Total acclimation wouldn't take place until a few more months at this height but she knew that the small steps she could take towards getting there would make the process a little faster.

Soundwave was busy ticking away at his own station and occasionally leaving the room temporarily to tend to something and then returning about every 10 minutes. Kirsten awoke with a snap of pain on her hand. Her eyes fluttered open and she winced at the small wound. Soundwave had caught her dozing off with her chin resting in her hand at the desk. She sighed, rolled her eyes and started typing again. Soundwave immediately became upset at her disrespect and he advanced a singular tentacle towards her. Her heart skipped a few beats as the tentacle with four small prongs at the end of it took hold of her arm and jerked her forward off her seat. She winced.

Soundwave's face reflected her own before lighting up, depicting a graph that illustrated time and work efficiency. Kirsten stared at his face, reading the graph as if it was her job evaluation. She stiffened her shoulders and her body twisted at the pain he inflicted in her arm, it was tight.

"I'm s-sorry." she said. She didn't know what else to say other than that her excuse was that she was tired. She didn't want to come off looking weak because she was usually a very strong person inside, but she balled up the instant that he touched her and became so apprehensive that the simplest of thinking tasks was hindered. Soundwave loomed over her like a dark shadow, looking as if he was piercing his way through her entire body. His warmth was stronger than before. He was so much more menacing than she had previously thought. The fact that his face couldn't emote nor speak to her kept her guessing. Soundwave's grip on her arm slowly become lesser and then he let her go completely. She fell forward off her chair and stumbled unbalanced to the edge of the platform before catching herself. He then proceeded to check her work.

He opened her computer screen on his own larger one and began reading her transcriptions. Kirsten rubbed her arm and watched him go through her file. He had opened the Cybertron document and the English document she had written up, going through them sentence by sentence. The room was an emerald shade of green from the computer light and his and her face glowed with the green diffusion. As Soundwave scrolled, he became impressed that she had transcribed so much in a short amount of time for a human. Megatron will definitely be pleased with the result and then use her for his own purpose if he deemed her worthy. Mech wasn't going to get away with their treachery so easily. The Decepticons knew exactly what they were going to do in order to use their own techniques against them.

Soundwave started typing, glancing sideways to see if she was still watching him.

He typed. :New task: in English.

Kirsten looked at the screen and then at him and then pointed to herself.

"You mean me?" she asked quietly.

He nodded and continued typing. :English-Cybertron Translate – PLANET:

He wanted her to translate 'planet' from English to Cybertronian? She thought for a minute and tapped her lip. She knew what it was, but didn't know how to say it, so she had to type it. But how was she supposed to-

Soundwave tapped his long finger twice on the Cybertronian keyboard indicating that she was allowed to use his equipment. 'No way' she thought. She was seriously going to get a chance to use that big hunk of technology? She hesitated forward and then placed her hands on the ledge of the keyboard. Her platform spanned the majority of the thin and numerous keys, about ten feet wide and three deep she mentally measured. She tracked down the symbol she was looking for and then reached forward for it. Before she pressed it, she glanced upward over her shoulder at Soundwave, making sure that this was what she was supposed to do. His only confirmation was crossing his arms. 'Fine', she thought. She pressed it.

A static voice spoke to her in Cybertronian, it was in her head, a whirlwind of information blew around her brain like wind. It was like being electrocuted with a pummel of information in a static shower. The electric connection of her fingers to her brain from the key was strong and she held on until she couldn't take it anymore. She scrolled through the words penetrating her mind and pictured the symbol and immediately let her finger off the key, not knowing whether she had done it correctly. She held her head in her hands, dizzy from the amount of energy she felt. She regained her balance after a few moments and looked up to the screen to see what she did. A single symbol shone on the screen, one that meant...planet. She didn't know how that happened, but it did. She knew how it worked but not first hand, until now. Each key represented a topic and by connecting with that topic as one touched the key, thoughts could be translated to words (or symbols) via contact with the key. The key was a gateway to her mind and became an extension of her brain. The electric bonds that formed and connected with her own brain activity while she touched it. It was intense.

Soundwave nodded and unfolded his arms. He typed a few symbols for her to read. She read them.

"Do I know why I'm here?" she said out loud after reading it. "To transcribe Cybertronian war operations into English for Mech." she said with uncertainty. Soundwave moved his head from side to side, slowly. His indigo striations pulsed lighter she thought she saw, and suddenly she couldn't swallow.

"No?" Kirsten asked him and wrinkled her forehead with worry. Shifting back on the ledge of the keyboard, Kirsten's heart raced as Soundwave ominously leaned into her. Her breath hitched in her throat.

He then pointed to himself.


	4. Where your loyalty lies

Ch 4

It was the day to start reporting to her superiors, the professor, Alan, and Megatron. A week had passed and she had translated already 50 pages worth of Cybertron documents to English. Soundwave hadn't asked her to transcribe any more Cybertronian after her one word.

Living quality hadn't been her favorite part. She mostly had old canned soups on most days for breakfast, lunch and dinner and she had water jugs provided by the gallon. She was sure she had already lost a few pounds. Talk was scarce too. Soundwave never said anything, she wasn't even sure if he could talk. Megatron never came into the room to check on her status so her time passed silently and usually slowly. So she was excited to learn that she would be transported back to Earth to meet with Professor Alan and take a day off before her return to the ship.

She heard the door to her room squeak open as a drone walked in and told her to follow him. She nodded and followed close, but not too close, holding a handful of clothes including dirty underwear and socks in her arms. She followed him into the bridge of the ship where more of the Decepticons diligently worked at their quadrants. Megatron was standing on front of a screen with his back to her and Soundwave was standing next to him. The drone opened up a green swirling light from behind her and she turned around to gaze at it, covering her eyes with her hand. Soundwave looked back and headed her way. Megatron followed. The drone motioned for her to wait a second before entering so that Soundwave could give her something. She heard his distinct footsteps behind her and turned around again as he lowered his hand and gave her a disc about the size of a record. She stood with the record sized disc in her hand and listened closely to what Megatron had to say, her pulse racing.

"Kirsten," he sneered at his distaste of the human being on board his ship. " What do you intend on reporting to Mech upon your short return." It was an order, not a question. Kirsten shook from head to foot in front of Megatron. Her mouth opened but her brain was thinking too incoherently to make sense.

"Lord...Megatron..."she started, not forgetting the words her professor spoke to her before ending one of her first transmissions to him 'always address him as Lord', or else. "um..I have transcribed 50 pages of Cybertronian documents to English in under a week, I hope this is satisfactory." She blinked and her head pounded, it sounded so puny, her hard work summed up in one short sentence.

"I could care less, honestly." Megatron said blatantly, "You will tell Mech that you have transcribed only 30 pages."

"But, why?" she asked without thinking which resulted in Megatron stomping his foot so hard that it shook the balance from underneath her and she fell on her knees.

"You DON'T ask me questions..." he firmly stated, "You will tell them 30 pages. You will not mention anything about the ship, about us, our operations, nothing but what you've been instructed to do by them." He was obviously referring to their privacy and secrecy and then he added, "If you do, you will never regain access to this ship and your life will be in constant jeopardy."

She listened wide-eyed and nodded quickly.

"Y-yes sir." she gulped out, "Nothing, I give my word." And she really meant it.

He then motioned for her to enter the ground bridge. She nodded back to him and entered the green light.

Her body felt like it was in freefall for a short amount of time and then she emerged from the other side into Mech's headquarters. She looked around, surprised and a little relieved to see other humans.

"Kirsten," Professor Alan came to greet her from the side. "Welcome!" he smiled awkwardly.

"Um, hi" she meekly said back, "I..uh.." she didn't have any clue on what to say to him, so many things traversed her mind at that point, but she decided to stay quiet hoping he would be the one to opt for a more thorough explanation of her situation. He walked with her to the secure area of the base and they walked through the big sensor and metal detector. The alarms went off as loudly as they did sudden. She stood still and became breathless while guards pointed large guns at her. The professor came to her rescue.

"Do not worry." He said to his guards,"I know about the plate in your arm, I remember." He grabbed her arm and shook it around for everyone to see, they put their weapons down. She hastily shook her head in agreement. He inspected the scar on her wrist...just in case. "From what was that from?"

"Umm...surfing." she said. She remembered telling him about it in her class one day, how her previous science class tried to analyzed the metal for an experiment one day, seeing if the titanium composition could be embedded with circuitry...just for fun, as a hypothesis. It couldn't.

"I remember, come, follow me." He reached for the disc in her hand as they walked. "Thank you for bringing this, is there anything we can do for you while you're on land?" he chided confidently. She knew exactly what she want.

"Well...is there a place I can take a shower?" she asked halfway embarrassed.

The professor looked up at her over his thin-rimmed glasses, "You mean to tell me they didn't install running water up there?" he looked shocked. Kirsten shook her head at the professor's exclamation, why would they need to accommodate her like a hotel? They wouldn't do that.

"Well there's a toilet. Maybe an oversight? I don't know if they thought I could bathe and piss in the same water but..."

"Don't worry, we'll take care of that, Soundwave has told us that you're working hard." Professor Alan exclaimed.

"Oh..thanks." Kirsten said unenthusiastically. "Wait, Soundwave told you that? He doesn't tell me anything, he's never spoken to me." She said as she followed the professor to another scientists station.

"Well... if you haven't figured it out by now, he doesn't." the professor said back, leaning into a doorway and calling for someone. "He only transmits data... which is usually hard to understand," he responded, also a little unenthusiastically. "Ann! Ann please get out here, I have a job for you." he stood still again and waited for the person he called to show up.

"Oh, well that makes sense then." Kirsten frowned and sneered at the floor sarcastically. Ann, who was a punky cherry red-headed teenager, showed up at the door.

"Yes prof?" she said childishly. Kirsten couldn't help but make the connection, it was his daughter, they had the same nose, the same eyes and the same goofy mannerism.

"This is Kirsten, the Decepticon's transcriber, take her to the women's shower and provide her with some soap and toiletries. When you're done, meet me back in the conference room so we can discuss things.

"Kay, boss." Ann said to her dad, and he walked away.

Ann snapped her gum in her mouth as they walked the corridors, her insistent conversation leading into many facets of topics, Kirsten just nodded her head and listened, getting a word in edgewise here and there, but mostly just focused on getting a nice hot shower to cleanse herself.

An hour later, Ann and Kirsten entered the conference room where the professor and a few others were waiting for her. She sat down, her hair was darkened by the dampness by the good scrub she had, leaving her feeling lighter and nicer.

It was a long drawn out boring session, mostly explaining why they had abducted her and why they couldn't have just asked her.

"You would have said no." Professor Alan explained.

Kirsten thought about it for a moment and eventually nodded, "Yeah, you're right..." she concurred.

"I knew you were one of my best students, I didn't want to see that talent wasted."

"Hard to believe that I was the best one for the job." Kirsten stated, knowing there were more than a handful of universities now offering foreign relations with a Cybertron focus. Her professor talked on and on about how her skills were finely tuned and how he couldn't pass up the opportunity to put her translating skills to use. All the while, she tuned him out, finding herself longing for the silence of the Decepticon ship and her thoughts to herself, it made her question which place she liked more, and she knew she didn't like the crude coldness of the Decepticon battleship, but then again, not everyone talked her ear off at every moment that they could.

"Do you understand?" Professor Alan explained. Kirsten's ears perked and she nodded loyally even though she had no idea what he had said.

"Okay now, when we send you back, you have to answer to Lord Megatron, so-"

She had already kind of answered to him but she wasn't about to tell him that. She knew something sketchy was going on between both of them, a breech of loyalty and deception but she was smart enough not to say a word.

"Have any idea what your report will be?" The professor asked her directly. She shrugged her shoulders.

"Iunno..." she peeped.

"You can't answer like that!" Professor Alan stood up from his chair. "You have the gift of words on paper but not out of your mouth." Easy for him to say, he's not up there watching the titans walk over her all the time, especially Soundwave. Certainly, she was meek sometimes, but he didn't have to push it down her throat so rudely.

"How many pages of the first document have you recorded thus far?"He sat back down.

"30 pages so far." Kirsten kept her cool on the outside while knowing fully well that she lied. Luckily, her voice didn't quiver any.

The professor nodded. "Good, hopefully it moves a bit faster with the exposure that you get, we need those documents asap."

"Asap? I'm trying to get them done fast but what's the hurry? I am only one person and I'm trying to be as precise as possible."

The professor looked down at her, as he was very tall, and he non-nonchalantly cocked his head to the side and shrugged, "We just want efficient work time. Once you're done translating the first document, you are to start immediately on the next."

She nodded in silence and felt as if he was hiding something.

"Also... I want you to tell Megatron that we don't plan on starting construction on these projects until we have every document requested."

Kirsten felt that it was odd that he was telling her to relay an indifferent message to Megatron himself. If they were already in contact, why didn't he do it himself? Kirsten again felt the awkward air of a lie being created and that she was to serve as some kind of buffer zone.

"...Have you had the chance to explore the ship? Anything pop out at you as interesting? " the professor asked looked into his spectacles and shook her head.

"I haven't had any opportunity to use any equipment nor have I seen much of the ship. All I know is everything is very hard and metallic." She added the last part in a little more sarcastically than she wanted to but it got the idea across.

"Have you at least looked at the computer system that they use? It's a grand piece of technology!" He glanced her way again, "Have you used it?"

Kirsten, feeling conflicted inside, shook her head. This wasn't about Mech or the Decepticons anymore, this was about her and the things she was willing to do to survive, "No, I'm only confined to my workspace." After she said this the professor looked a little disappointed.

"Well, keep on guard though, since you have exclusive access to their controls, technology and equipment, we'd like to have a first hand experienced person inform us of what we're looking at."

"But isn't that why I'm translating these documents?" Kirsten asked quietly.

"Of course of course, but..." the professor stopped shortly, almost questioning whether he should say his next sentence or not. "We obviously can't trust them but they seem to think that we do, so that's why we convinced them to keep you on the ship. You are like an offering of truth and honesty because you will do no harm, theoretically." He chuckled slightly."But...other than the ability to translate those documents, you have a by-product of your situation. You're like our little spy."

Kirsten's stomach churned. Wait, so, she was being kept on the ship to keep the Decepticon's blind that MECH was potentially up to no good? What in the wide world were they planning? She didn't take the Decepticons for being naive or unwise to the situation, they had already hinted to her that MECH was not to be trusted also. She was so confused.

Another member of Mech had come into the room and whispered something in his ear and the professor nodded to him.

"You have to head back now." he said.

"What?! Wait, you told me I could have a day off." she pointed her finger at him but quickly retracted it when he glared at her. He started chuckling.

"Kirsten..." he said through chuckles, "I hope you learn your rank and some respect for your own good. You work for us and you will be compensated in time." He stood up and motioned for her to stand and leave.

Ann had put together a sack of clothes, some food and other things together for her before she left and dragged the bag after them as the walked into the area where she was transported into and then dropped it by her feet. Kirsten said thank you and hauled the bag over her shoulder. The green light shone in front of them. Kirsten took one step but was quickly stopped by an arm falling on her shoulders. Professor Alan's face leaned in close to her ear and he said, "Remember this, MECH is your shelter, report anything suspicious to me only, especially if you start hearing them discuss our organization. we need you to be on guard." She nodded her head diligently and walked into the light.

Upon her return, Soundwave and Megatron were waiting for her. She didn't even have time to deliver her bag before she met with them. Soundwave's tentacles suddenly blocked her path to her room and then scooped her up and around, dropping her on a platform in front of Megatron. Soundwave stepped back behind him, and then it was just the two of them.

"You may be right Soundwave, let's see how much this little human can do in a short amount of time." Megatron smirked as if continuing a conversation they were previously having. Soundwave nodded silently.

"Kirsten, your skills may have brought me a much more important reason to have you aboard this ship rather than just Mech's world government cooperation," he leaned in close to her, his sharp metal teeth just feet from her, and his red eyes making her body glow. "Remember who is the superior race here, remember who is the strongest, because that's who you work for, and that is me. You may be here on MECH duty, but if I have a task for you, you do it first."

Kirsten sighed. Everyone was just full of secrets but she continued to listen.

"And allow Soundwave and I to emphasize to you our superior technology over your MECH." Megatron looked up and so Kirsten also did. There was a small bird-like drone flying in from the hatch and it transformed and attached itself to Soundwave's chest. Kirsten was amazed but then she heard the professor's voice coming from Soundwave. He replayed words that the professor had spoke just moments earlier.

:We obviously cant trust them but they seem to think that we do.. You're like our little spy.:

Kirsten's jaw started to chatter, but she had had enough of being scared and nervous. She tried her hardest to summon the strength inside of her and she spoke.

"I told them nothing, as you know if you were there," indicating to Soundwave, "but I have no business being a spy when I am being used to my limits already by MECH and you. I'm not a spy and I don't want to be." Kirsten added shakily at the end.

"I know. You were very loyal." he replied to her in a snide, but confident tone.

"I don't seem to have a choice." she responded.

"Your loyalty lies in your fear." Megatron said, "Who do you fear most?" and he smirked.

Kirsten knew what Megatron wanted to hear, but it was the truth. "You." she whispered.

"I like you because you don't want to be here, nor do you want to work for MECH. I find this a perfect situation, don't you Soundwave?" Soundwave nodded his head in agreement. "Let me explain to you what your future task will be now that you've just admitted loyalty to me. Soundwave is deciphering, just like you, hidden codes in the governments documents. You will assist him. This is off your MECH records." He added while leaning down to her. "You will not mention a word of this to MECH because if you do..." and his eyes came level with hers, "I will kill you. I will find out if you have betrayed us." He leaned even closer with his next statement, "And Soundwave will be watching you, always." She didn't doubt that...she hadn't even noticed that his mini-drone had been circling and recording their interactions. She had no choice now though, she was working for the Decepticons whether she liked it or not.

"Soundwave will work beside you, report to me your findings." Megatron sneered and turned away. Kirsten was lifted off the platform by Soundwave and he picked up her bag with a single tentacle. She followed him to her temporary room for now, and the door squeaked closed behind them. Soundwave dropped the bag on her bed and immediately made his way to the screen where he diligently started working. Kirsten had noticed some changes upon her arrival. Where her belongings and mattress was, had been sectioned off, it looked like pieces of scrap metal had been placed meticulously around the confines of her "room" making it more private. 'Nice,' she thought, how considerate of them. She began going through the bag but before she could even grab the first article of clothing, Soundwave had picked it up with a tentacle again. She frowned and looked over to him.

Soundwave was facing her, his head shook side to side slowly and a long slender finger rose to point directly to her workstation. She forced herself to get up without pouting, although it was hard to hide, but she didn't want to test the patience of the titans at this time, so she cooperated. She climbed the slim stairs and sat in her chair, Soundwave opened something on his screen and then transferred it to hers. He peered down at her. She focused on the document in front of her, it looked like Latin but the words were so redistributed and coded that on first or second glance, she couldn't calculate it out. She tried to press her luck a bit by communicating with words.

"So...this is the document Lord Megatron wants me to decode?" she meekly asked Soundwave, glancing up his way.

Soundwave nodded immediately to her and also showed her on the screen his own codes trying to decipher the message himself. He pointed to the screen in different places, all the while Kirsten watched his work progress. She started to doubt herself, her instincts were telling her that she could figure it out, but what could she figure out that he couldn't? The professor had briefly told her a little about Soundwave, the mech who could hack anything, who could unscramble anything and who could infiltrate any electrical current. Maybe that was the problem though... maybe it was not mechanical enough for him.

"How much time do I have for this? She asked, a little more confidently this time. He held up three long fingers.

"Days?"

He nodded. Kirsten had taken small classes on decoding and statistics and patterns, all were related somewhat to learning new languages, especially when it came to symbols. Kirsten sighed hard and ran fingers through her hair nervously. "It looks very organic in nature, is that why you need my help?" she asked unsuspectingly. Soundwave thrust his head up and looked down on her while his hands crossed angrily in front of him.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. My bad." she suddenly responded after noticing that her comment had upset him, "it's just that, you're ...the...it's.. my assistance, not my help...assistance." she covered her face in embarrassment and hoped she wouldn't end up being disciplined again. She counted to ten, supposing it may be okay to peek out from around her hands. Soundwave was already working again on the computer screen as if he had nothing more to do with her that moment. She relaxed and immediately started her decoding task, her first Decepticon task.


	5. Patterns

CH 5: Patterns

She liked patterns, she liked connections and she liked problem-solving. The problem with that was, the document was in several different codes, none with traditional patterns, and none with easy solving techniques. Some parts were even in different languages altogether, Ethiopian, Thai, Latin...this required deep searches on the internet. Finally at the end of the second day, she had cracked most of the codes and began to translate into English as well as Cybertronian, but part of the document she read stopped her suddenly.

She read what she had just typed, and read it again, making sure she had translated correctly. It looked like it had been sent from the U.N. to the head of Mech. It looked like counter strikes against the Decepticons, from Mech themselves, using their own technology. Kirsten now understood, they knew that these documents held hidden threats, but did they know that it was directly from their supposed own ally? She began to lose track of the number of betrayals. She continued through the night, translating the rest of it, her interest suddenly peaked for her own survival. It had already taken her two days to decode the short message and now all she had to do was translate. Afterall, she was trained in transcriptions, not decoding, but the territory of the topic merged somewhat.

Soundwave recharged at irregular hours and because of that, he worked irregular hours. He entered his workspace and was surprised to find Kirsten still working. Kirsten looked up briefly at him to acknowledge his presence and then continued working. Soundwave made a few sounds that made her look up again and she looked him in the face. He flashed the earth's time to her, it was 4:31 am and then he held out his hand towards her 'room'. He also flashed that familiar graph with time/work efficiency briefly for her coupled with another statistic...rest and alertness. She rubbed her face wearily and tilted her head back, letting her long hair fall against the back of the chair and she deliriously smiled.

"I can't...I'm almost done." she said to him. Soundwave cocked his head to the side and leaned in closer to see what she was working on. He was astounded that the human had worked all through the night, through her recharge time to translate the code. But of course, his stoic demeanor didn't portray his astonishment and he simply nodded to her and tapped on his own screen to work.

They worked together for a few hours in silence. Oddly enough to Kirsten, it was nice having someone with her, even if they didn't speak or like each other very much. She came to enjoy just his mere presence to know that she wasn't ever alone at 25,000 feet. On the contrary, Soundwave still felt a bit cautious with her around. His private space had been invaded with a new species and he couldn't get used to the idea of having a human live in his work area. Mech must have had a great argument for Megatron to agree to this. But then, Megatron always had a plan.

The morning came and Soundwave was busy at his workspace while Kirsten had dozed off in front of hers. A sudden jerk from the ship awoke her, and she remembered what it is that she was doing.

'Just a few more lines...' she thought, and the ship jerked again. Soundwave among others received a transmission from Megatron to come to the loading bay at once, and so he began to leave the room. Kirsten's eyes were itchy and blurry from her all-nighter but she couldn't stop now, right when it was finally getting interesting. As Soundwave left the room, he took a quick glance at Kirsten to see her progress, was she really almost done? He had to take a double take, yes, she had reached nearly the end of the document. Her work ethics far surpassed his expectations.

When Soundwave had left the room, Kirsten had time to think for herself. She became furious at the letter. Mech had allowed her to board a ship that they had planned on shooting down eventually, with the Decepticon's own technology! She assumed that they would at least get her off the ship when this was supposed to happen. She sat back in her chair and crossed her arms and huffed a deep breath. She again questioned her loyalty. Neither of them, Mech or the Decepticons, were in the least bit amiable to her, maybe except for Ann who was probably too stuck in teenage life to know what her father was involved in. That reminded her, she hadn't gone through her supplies yet. She saved the now finished file and transferred it to Soundwave's screen and bounded down the stairs.

She sat on the bed and picked up the sack which she hadn't looked into yet and started going through it. Nice. Extra toilet paper, extra pants and clothes, underwear, a brush! Kirsten was excited about that. She started to brush her mangy hair as she went through the rest of it. Ann had put in a small led lantern, soap, shampoo, perfume, 'seriously?' Kirsten thought...and a small white teddy bear.

Kirsten squished the teddy bear in her hand and began to tear up. She hadn't asked for her current situation, but it was reality. She wondered if the government had anything to do with telling her family where she was, or...where they told them that she was. Soundwave picked the wrong time to walk in.

Kirsten had tears rolling down her eyes, squeezing the teddy bear to her chest when he stumbled in on her. She froze in place 'damnit' she thought, every time she had tried to make herself look strong, he would always catch her in a state of weakness. She immediately threw the bear down to the ground and got to her feet and stoically walked to the stairs and up them. Soundwave was perplexed at her sudden turn of behavior, but what she couldn't do was stop the wetness from flooding her cheeks. She reached the top of the platform but Soundwave halted her with a large hand in front of her face.

He was looking at the material on his screen, the material she had decoded and translated to English. Reading it sentence by sentence, Soundwave's head moved back and forth until he came to the end. Kirsten didn't speak a word during this time and her tears had stopped. Soundwave didn't expect her to be this useful, but she had proven herself otherwise.

He replayed her words in his own head 'organic in nature...my help?'. He didn't like the idea of needing assistance, but she was right...Megatron was right. His mechanical and mathematical approaches would have taken him too long to solve the code in the letter. Perhaps the reason Mech did it in such a way was because of him. He stared at it for a long time in silence and then turned to face her.

Kirsten's eyes widened and she stuttered, "Soundwave, I..uh..it's done but I just need to translate it into Cybertronian for you...if..you...wan-" she stopped suddenly with the large claw that was in front of her slowly moving in, taking her left hand and placing it on his own keyboard, the one she had used before the previous day. Yes, he nodded, translate it. He wanted to see how fast she could get it done. It would save him a lot of time and energy if she could do it, even if she wasn't as fast as him, he could use the time to do other things.

Kirsten's hand roamed the edge of the keyboard again. Soundwave watched her intently. Her lips curled up at the ends in a small smirk. Her fingers ran along the length of the ledge in both directions and then came back again together in front of her. Soundwave wondered why she was doing this, she was wasting time, intriguing though the action may be. Watching her caress the keyboard with surpassed passion perplexed him, but then the more he watched her, the more he slightly understood her simple action.

It was something new, something foreign, a virgin encounter and untouched terrain. He remembered how he felt when they infiltrated Earth's energy. It was simply magnificent to create new connections and build new memories and learn new types of energy. He felt suddenly like the human race wasn't so different from his own just then. Kirsten and him shared a passion between their species, he didn't know that it would feel quite so gratifying to work with someone who understood his ways.

Kirsten bit her lip in excitement but then her weariness overcame her. She stopped rubbing the keyboard and looked to him. Soundwave found himself waiting for her to speak to him, because that's when she did, was when she looked at him. He had noted all of her patterns thus far.

"May I start after I rest a bit?" she asked him quietly.

Soundwave acknowledged the fact that she had worked through the night for him and so he decided let her nap. He measured her thermal brain activity and found that it had slowed slightly and he also noticed that her hair wasn't as lumpy as before, interesting. Nodding, he motioned his hand towards the bed and she descended the stairs.

"Thank you." she said softly.

Soundwave exited the room, ready to get some other work done but he couldn't help but feel as if she understood his worth ethics, more so than the Decepticons. Perhaps in her species, work ethics varied widely as well and luckily for him, Mech had found a human whose concentration to a task surpassed others. She didn't say much either. She was meek. Though, she seemed as if she had a lot of things that she wanted to say. He didn't mind that, the less one spoke, the more one listened and observed his surroundings and therefore the smarter he became. The MECH organization was full of idiots who spoke too much without any substance, and his other Decepticon comrades said just as much.

But him being master spy and top intelligence officer, Soundwave had learned to control his words and met them with actions, and had accomplished a lot more than anyone else, save Megatron perhaps, but Megatron also knew when to control himself, that's why he had stayed loyal to him. He thought about the many tasks available at his disposal with their new human accomplice. After all, efficiency was the key to great power. She wasn't boisterous or overly objective. Soft, quiet...but then again... at MECH she had been louder and more decisive around her own species. He understood why they thought that she was perfect to spy for them, she was adaptable.


	6. A Wrench in the Mix

**Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, followed, fav...This chapter will be a bit more on the lighter side, Knock Out shows for a few laughs. Rememeber, romance never happens overnight. ;)**

CH 6

"Kirsten!" A transmission suddenly showed up on her laptop screen while she was busy looking at her nails. Kirsten jumped in her seat and sat up straight to look Megatron in the face on her screen.

"Yes!" she said immediately. Megatron glared back and snarled.

"Yes...Lord Megatron!" she retracted and spurted out.

"You learn slow, but well for a puny human.."

Kirsten hated the fact he insistently reminded her that she was weak and puny. Only in the company of the giants, she thought, but they kept her around and alive for a reason so all she could do was hold her tongue.

"...We have intercepted another letter from the U.N to Mech, as if they could keep their secret plans...secret..." he chuckled evilly. "I will send Soundwave in shortly with the information, you have three days, make it quick!" and he ended the transmission.

Kirsten had been working on transcribing Mech's requested documents lately, because she would need something to report with, and by keeping them happy, she kept them from second-guessing her. She was due to return with a report in one more week. She kept the translated documents coming and Mech didn't suspect anything malicious from her. When her time was needed, Soundwave kept her on top of his own duty and she obeyed him.

Later in the evening, at least she thought it was evening, it felt something like it, she had just gotten done typing the end of another small document for Mech when a bot she didn't recognize entered the room.

"Blasted Soundwave, where does he keep that fucking thing." he noticed the small human watching him out of the corner of her eye.

"Woah**,**" he said. It was Knock Out, the Decepticon's doctor, "Well that's something I don't come across often in Soundwave's office." He was on his hands and knees looking for something. He disdainfully stood up and brushed himself off, "And you are...?" Knock Out placed his hands on his hips and waited for her to entertain his invitation for her introduction.

She sat quietly and didn't say anything right away, she didn't know if she should, was this guy supposed to be in here? She looked him up and down, noticing his armor, his refined glitz, his pretty face and his smug demeanor. Soundwave didn't seem like the type to want just anyone walking into his workspace, this mech entered too casually to suspect anything.

"Kirsten." she said.

"That's it? Kirsten?" he laughed softly, "May I just say that I was a little surprised to see you in here, I don't uh, usually crawl around on my knees, you know...scars up the paint." he smirked slightly. "Are...uh, are you a prisoner or something? Because I was not notified of this arrangement." he suddenly looked serious while pointing his finger in all directions as he spoke.

"No, I work for Soundwave." she turned in her seat to face him directly and arched her eyebrows.

"Heheh...that's a good one. Soundwave? Enlist the assistance of a human?" He scoffed at the very idea. "Absurd."

She was insulted, how could he conclusively judge her so fast. She had enough of this treatment and before she knew what she was doing, she responded.

"That's presumptuous of you."

"Yeah, you think?" He responded arrogantly, "You're a human." As if it was some kind of explanation for their difference in intelligence.

"You doubt my abilities?" she said back to him, crossing her arms and legs simultaneously. Her pulse elevated with her sudden turn of face and she shook on the inside with fear but she kept her calm on the outside. 'Shit...' her mind told her, but her eyes portrayed a different person. Brilliant blue eyes were shining back at his glowing red ones, reflecting his own emitted optic light, making them turn an odd shade of purple.

"Why shouldn't I?" he replied back to her, his voice dripping with insult.

Kirsten stood up on her platform and placed her hands on her hips too, mimicking Knock Out's pose. They glared at each other for a moment of time, almost playing a staring game, if it wasn't such a harsh encounter. Soundwave's footsteps could be heard and he entered the room and was caught in the middle of their minor spat. He looked back and forth from Knock Out to Kirsten trying to deduce the situation. Knock Out was the one to parry first. He shook his head loose from her gaze and addressed Soundwave.

"Is this yours?" he asked blatantly pointing a finger at her.

Soundwave nodded.

"Well you might need to remind her to show a little respect to her superiors!" he said violently.

Kirsten was flustered and ready to retort against him but her courage was just a tad too short to actually do it. Luckily, Soundwave walked forward between the two of them and hushed them both by raising his hands, separating them.

"Oh come on, Soundwave. She's a human, what can you possibly do with that?" Soundwave turned his face to look at Knock Out and blankly glared him down.

"Fine...fine, it's your business." He threw his hands up in surrender and started to walk out of the room. He mumbled as he disappeared around the corner.

Soundwave turned back to his computer and began opening data.

"He was looking for something of yours, I think." Kirsten said below him. Soundwave stopped what he was doing and looked down at her. His gaze met hers and they stared silently for a bit.

Thinking that maybe he wanted her to continue what she was going to say, she continued her sentence, "I don't know what for.."

Soundwave thought for a moment, what would Knock Out be in his area looking for that he didn't have in his own. He looked around the room and focused on a small locked chamber to his right. He walked over to it and opened the door to the chamber and there he picked up his relic, the Resonance Blaster. Kirsten saw the item that he held, it looked menacing, so it probably was. Soundwave turned back to her and dipped his head at the Resonance Blaster and then turned it confidently in his hand.

Unbeknownst to her, Soundwave was actually picking his tests delicately, seeing if he could really trust her. On her next visit to MECH, he would be sure to know with her having this knowledge of this relic.

Soundwave's visor suddenly shifted to a blueprint of the ship. Kirsten learned that he was showing her how to locate the members on the Nemesis. He pinpointed Knock Out's ping on his way to the bridge. Seeing the direction he was headed led to a brightest ping of all, it must be Megatron. Understanding the layout, she looked back at another illustration that depicted the same thing on Soundwave's huge screen by her workstation. 'Oh so that's what that is.' she thought.

"Okay." She confirmed that she understood and then he walked out of the room to give the Resonance Blaster to Knock Out. Kirsten followed the red dot leading out from their room towards the front of the ship, she placed her hand on one of the keys of the keyboard and his ping blipped twice and then showed his name, his Cybertronian name, in symbols. She noted that to herself and then tried the same thing with other bots on the ship. She found Knock Out and Megatron next. She saw many other pings that were represented in dots of different sizes and colors. Maybe she'd learn in due time who they were, if she lasted that long.

When Soundwave approached Megatron and Knock Out on the bridge of the Nemesis they were discussing a mission as he came up behind them. Knock Out had used the Resonance Blaster before, but Megatron had custody over it before he turned it over to Soundwave. He wasn't delighted at the thought of Knock Out using his special tool again, last time he had returned it with barely enough energy to blast out 4 amps.

"Soundwave, I have a message for you to deliver to the human." Megatron said, interrupting his own conversation with Knock Out.

"What? You trust this human too?" Knock Out said surprised. "My Lord- it seems too uncharacteristic of you to trust any of these indigenous creatures, after all they've done to get us destroyed!"

"Of course I don't trust her! But I also don't feel as if her presence is threatening. While I agree with your sentiments, Knock Out, this situation is quite a bit different." Megatron said while he walked over to Soundwave. "Nothing that she has done would make us think of her intentions as malicious so far, in fact, she's proven to be more helpful than we previously conjured." Megatron sneered at the words he spoke, not happy to admit that working with a human was actually good for them.

"What is it exactly that Soundwave is using her for?" Knock Out said suspiciously folding his arms across his chest again. He actually directed his words towards Soundwave who silently stood as his master and the doctor dictated the direction of the conversation.

"Well if you are concerned any of your own life and safety, you should not be so hostile to the little thing," Megatron chided, "Our allies are our enemies and fortunately we have their own tool to use as a weapon against themselves, just as they have decided to do with us." Megatron squeezed his fists in rage, "Mech will realize soon enough that we will not tolerate their betrayals! Then...then we may dispose of her, but until then." Megatron finished.

Soundwave swiftly analyzed the situation. He was processing quicker now that she was there to do his tedious work for him. He got Megatron's attention and showed graphs of work and progress through his visor. Megatron growled softly.

"Very well Soundwave, perhaps you see the bounty of her existence beyond her current tasks, but we shall see when the time deems right." Megatron responded.

Knock Out suddenly interrupted. "Hah. Bounty indeed!" Knock Out then proceeded to hold his hands out, cupping them, and squeezing the air. Megtron and Soundwave quickly snapped their heads to look at Knock Out.

"What! All I'm saying is that if I was going to have a human sitting around MY room... might as well be something pleasing to the eye, so when you're done with her, let me know!" Knock Out shrugged his shoulders stubbornly and gave Soundwave a smug look. "She may have a head full of goo, but seriously though..." he curled his fingers into a ball and then stretched them again, squeezing the air, "...that ass." Knock Out said again, smirking, in efforts to create some kind of reaction from Soundwave. He wasn't budging though, mostly because he had nothing to contribute to the situation. Her ass held no relevant information that he needed, so what was his point.

Knock Out walked up to Soundwave and took the Resonance Blaster from his hands, freely. Soundwave stood still and silent while Knock Out continued to pass smug glances his way. It was annoying Soundwave quite a bit until he had had enough and raised his arm and shoved his cannon in Knock Out's pretty face.

"Knock Out," Megatron replied sternly, "I'm sure Soundwave is not interested in your physical preoccupation with his subordinate. She is here on duty and I suggest you get back to yours." Megatron looked around him, annoyed, "All of you!"


	7. New assets

Ch 7

The dreary, monotonous days passed so slowly. Had she been there two weeks so far? Three? Maybe more or less but nothing seemed routine. Confined to one room sometimes nearly drove her crazy. Living quality had taken a turn for the better since she found a few metal scraps to piece together around her 'toilet' which was more of a bowl shaped depression and pouring water down a pipe like they did in rural Asia. Where the water went? She didn't know, and didn't want to think about it. Into the atmosphere she imagined.

Certainly, she had lost weight, not a ton, but enough to notice that her stomach was flat and her butt not so heavy. The canned soups had become tasteless and she dreamed of hot water. Lately, she was entertaining herself through ripping the labels off the used cans and making a privacy curtain out of them for over her bathing/toilet area just in case. Soundwave had yet to walk in on her during a private moment, even though scrap had been used for two small walls, peering down for him was easy. The walls were only about 9 feet high but just enough so she felt a small security inside of them.

It was only two days until her second evaluation with Mech and she was still in the middle of decoding the U.N's second letter. It was in a completely different coding sequence as the last one and was taking her a longer time to do. She had become frustrated with it and was having a hard time concentrating, so she was taking a small break after her lunch to clear her head and attach the soup labels together with some string she had unthreaded from the bag that Ann packed for her.

* * *

On the bridge of the ship, Megatron was in the process of sending out a team to collaborate with the Australian government in order to start digging for new-found deposits of energon. Four miners and Dreadwing were to be deployed on Megatron's command once they got the green light.

"Soundwave, send Laserbeak with them, they will need unprecedented back up for obvious reasons."

Megatron commanded.

Soundwave deployed Laserbeak from his chest and his pet flew around the bridge room, waiting to leave with the other Decepticons.

"And Soundwave, I have another situation," Megatron continued. Soundwave kneeled deeply before his master and stood again.

"I need you to keep an eye on the east Mech base for anything out of the ordinary. The scanners picked up unusual activity there and I'm afraid we missed the memo." His upper lip lifted in disgust and his eyes were motionless on the screen in front of him. Soundwave acknowledged and he started immediately to prepare for his spy duty in a small area of West Virginia.

* * *

Kirsten was back working at her station when Soundwave came in again, hastily making his way to the computer, downloading, analyzing, learning, spying. Kirsten glanced a few times at his screen but she barely understood anything it was depicting, he went too fast. She was beginning to be quite intrigued by Soundwave. She wondered what it would be like to be 18 feet tall, have access to anything on a foreign planet, be able to have all kinds of uninhibited power. Power to use at her own disposal.

She shook her head from these thoughts. She reminded herself of Mech just then, she didn't want to be anywhere close to being associated with the way they operated. But what if they were doing a good favor to the world? What of these Decepticons and their agenda? She shook those thoughts from her head too. No time to think, only obey in her situation. She noticed a lack of sound from the room. There were no hums or blips or ticks...

Soundwave had suddenly stopped his work and stood in silence.

Kirsten quickly went back to decoding on her own computer for fear that he would notice her, noticing him. He stood still for several moments, the symbols on his screen halted along with himself. Curiosity and human nature was starting to beat her. Kirsten couldn't help but be interested...

She looked with her eyes only, at the screen, trying to seem as if she wasn't looking at all. She could read the symbols slowly and somewhat accurately because of the stopped action. The symbols were only bits of information, not leading to a distinctive conclusion, but what she could make out of them were : 24: testing: wires: Mech: three: nuclear cannon: meeting: mountains: and some more numbers and equations. She watched as Soundwave dipped his head, looking as if he was deep in thought.

Kirsten ticked away on her keyboard, a little cautious and noticing of his unresponsive demeanor. She tried not to show that she was watching him and quite suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, his sharp hand came out of nowhere and latched onto her right hand. She stifled her scream, her heart pounded and her eyes became paralyzed in terror.

Soundwave jerked her hand forward and leaned closer to her arm for a closer inspection. He rotated her arm up and down, flipping to analyze both sides. Kirsten stayed placed in her seat while she watched Soundwave investigate her right arm, gripping the seat with white knuckles.

He noted that her blood pressure increased dramatically when he took a hold of her appendage and started flipping it about. His visor finally showed something she could understand.

:H202-35%-AlHCo3-.001%-40%-3000AMP-CoTiX30ppm:

No, she couldn't understand that. What was he doing? She expressed concern in her face and held tightly to the chair. Soundwave flipped her hand palm up and then slowly brought his other hand forward and tapped lightly on her wrist. The titanium result from a wild day on her shortboard.

"My wrist fusion?" she asked. Kirsten understood now but what did he want to use it for? He took his slender, sharp finger and ran it down the length of her scar while delicately still holding her arm in place. He then showed an equation and a layout of complex circuitry through his visor.

"No way.." she said under her breath. He wanted to write codes into the metal plate, but still, she wondered, for what.

"Why?" she asked. Soundwave didn't answer that question and he stood tall again and started to walk out of the room, motioning for her to follow. She looked back at her computer screen, but she was in the middle of this...so she reluctantly saved her progress. She then quickly gathered her guts about her and trembled down the stairs, sprinting over to the door to catch up with him. Before she could think, a singular tentacle was wrapping itself around her whole body starting from the waist down. She tripped into the long cord and gasped at the warm, smooth metal suddenly lifting her as it wrapped her in it's coil.

She placed her hands on the top cord for stability, it felt like snake skin in her palms, kind of textured and kind of not, but very smooth. She was then transported in the air behind Soundwave as he made his way to Knock Out's annex.

The corridors were long and dark to Kirsten. Every guard they passed seemed to scurry out of Soundwave's path. Kirsten thought, he was either a very well-respected Mech, or very ominous. Maybe both.

In Knock Out's workroom, the operating room, Soundwave communicated his plan to the doctor, and he threw a fit.

"You want me to do what?!" Knock Out complained to Soundwave, throwing a tool on the ground. "That's just too far, you're putting way too much trust in this thing!" he retorted.

Soundwave thrust his chest out and then held out his hand, curling his fingers requiring his Resonance Blaster back.

"Ugh, seriously?" He rubbed his face slightly and scowled. "You drive a hard bargain, Soundwave." Knock Out then looked at Kirsten, he glared, remembering their last encounter. Kirsten avoided eye-contact with him, still not in the loop as to what was about to transpire. Soundwave slowly turned Kirsten over to Knock Out, placing her on a large metal table and sending him the exact circuits, installments, and codes he wanted written into the plate.

"Alright, give me... oh...an hour or two." Knock Out said to Soundwave and turned his back to him. Soundwave crossed his arms and stood behind him stubbornly. Knock Out didn't like working in the company of others, having Soundwave loom behind him was...disturbing.

Knock Out sighed loud and flung himself around to face him."Soundwave you know I was just joking about the comments I made earlier! You really don't trust me alone with her?" Soundwave shook his head in refusal and showed him his plan again. If Knock Out messed up his plans, he would have to answer to Megatron.

"Fine." he said sternly. "You act the same way when I work on Laserbeak, I guess I should be used to it." he shook his head offensively and detached a tube in the wall and brought it to Kirsten's face. She jerked away in defense.

"What's that!" she demanded, unable to control her self-defense mechanism.

"Relax, gas, unless you want to be awake through the whole procedure." Knock Out smirked tauntingly, "To be honest, I personally don't want to hear your screams of agony while I cut you open inch by inch and slowly embed personal Cybertronian spy technology into your slow, human, life liquid."

Knock Out backed off when he heard Soundwave signal from his visor that his time was being wasted. He rolled his eyes and grabbed the back of Kirsten's head, not so gently, and shoved the tube in her face. She struggled away from the tube but he had a firm hold of her. Her struggles became weaker and weaker until she struggled no more.

Later...

Kirsten drearily opened her eyes. She was out of focus and felt sick to her stomach. Her arm felt even worse.

"Locator system working... audio transmitter functional...system statistics normal...atmospheric censor...functional." Knock Out was repeating the program monitor being transmitted from her arm. "Looks like everything is working properly." Soundwave nodded and then checked his own monitor dispatch system, making sure it connected to hers. All information looked good.

Kirsten slowly came to and felt the urge to vomit immediately. She gagged and then heaved on Knock Out's table.

"Well that's just great!" Knock Out yelled, "What a disgusting carnal reflex."

Embarrassed to the full extent of her ability, Kirsten lowered her head while she coughed up the rest. She was shaky and cold. He was such an asshole. She noticed the small scar where they had opened her up. It looked exactly the same as it did before except a little red and irritated. She took a closer look at it, amazed by the exact craftsmanship.

"How..did you.." she choked out.

"I'm a really good doctor." Knock Out said, anticipating the question. He then started to clean up the table taking a laser torch and dissipating the blood and vomit.

Knock Out took the opportunity to glance at Soundwave, who was still standing in the same place. Knock Out nodded his way in a mutual understanding before a transmission from Megatron on the screen requested for Soundwave to report to him immediately. Soundwave faced Knock Out and uncrossed his arms.

"I will return her once she is stable," Knock Out replied with a groan, openly protesting his discomfort at taking responsibility for her.

Soundwave left the room quickly, and without sound. Knock Out turned back to face the human on his table, still obviously bothered by her presence.

Kirsten looked around his room, all the tools were meticulously organized and he kept the place pretty clean. Would it be wise to initiate small conversation?

"I guess I don't get what he sees..." Knock Out said randomly. "But he has his methods." he spoke as he was putting away his tools, "No matter how inferior those methods may be." He may have been talking to himself, but Kirsten took the insulting cue.

She rolled her eyes and curled her lips hostilely at his words. He caught her doing so at a glance and he angrily slammed his hands down on both sides of her, shuddering a vibration through her whole body.

"And don't think you are above all the rest! Because let's make this clear..." Knock Out barked in her face, "You, are still below me. You need to act like it! I don't care if you're Soundwave's little human accomplice. you. are. still. a. meaningless. human. You are deceptive, cunning creatures and I don't trust you. Any of you!" Knock Out had finished his rant expecting to argue some more to her response. He looked to her, waiting, wanting for her to just say the very first wrong thing so he could bark back.

"Come on! Anything? Do you want to defend yourself in the slightest?"

"Not really." she finally said softly.

Knock Out, taken aback by her submissive response became agitated. "So you agree." he sinisterly raised a brow plate.

"Yes... I mean..." she choked up, placing her hands in front of her, wanting to talk, but...when she formulated the words in her mind, even she didn't believe herself.

"Go on." Knock Out prodded. He relaxed his face slightly, intrigued as to what she might have to say.

Kirsten didn't trust him, he was too hostile in only his company, but what choice did she have? She chose her words delicately.

"I'm only doing what I can to stay alive by working for Soundwave. I want no part of this! But..." she trailed off.

"...But..." he echoed her.

"But... here I am." she quirked, indicating with the start of a calmer demeanor. She shrugged, broke eye contact with him and looked sideways.

Knock Out had no response to that. He pursed his lips in thought. Soundwave obviously trusted her, he wondered why. He trusted Soundwave and his intentions even though he took pleasure in giving him a hard time. Probably because of his own unwillingness to cooperate with the other species. Perhaps Soundwave was onto something. He sighed and leaned into the table and relaxed his arms from beside her. He spoke without concern in is voice. "You seem stable enough... I'll return you to the gateway room."


	8. Call of the Wild

Ch 8: Call of the wild

Kirsten was walked back to the Gateway Room with Knock Out, who was watching out for bigger mechs who happened not to look down, following her into the room. She was cold, very cold. She sniffled and headed straight for her walled 'room' and plopped on the small matress. She rolled herself up in the blanket that was on top of the mattress and groaned sickly. The shock to her body lingered, as it does.

"Hmm.." Knock Out wondered aloud. Since he wasn't busy at the moment, he decided to roost for a while, just to... check on her. He went over to Soundwave's computer and started typing, looking at the data that showed on the screen.

"My my, it looks like Soundwave has kept you busy." He said as he nodded to the screen, "Looks like you've logged a lot of hours." He continued in a suspicious manner. He typed some more, opening more windows and then was halted by an enormous red X and a short audible hiss.

"What!? Locked!?" Knock Out said, annoyed. Kirsten looked up from the blanket she was in and tried to make out what he was getting into. It looked like Soundwave had locked all the data they had been working on. Kirsten figured he was trying to find out if she was telling the truth or not. He sighed emphatically and tried again. Same X and hiss. He turned to look at her through the corner of his eye and then drifted around so his back was against the workstation. He casually folded a hand and fingers over and over in front of his face.

"Now why would Soundwave block access to this information?" he peered at her suspiciously.

Kirsten was looking back at him when he asked the question but she shrugged. She had seen Soundwave work and then lock the computer after each time he was done with it, but when he knew that she had to work with it as well after he had left the room, he had kept it open, only for a short time until he came back, but nevertheless, it was open for her to use but closed for public use.

"Is it because he probably doesn't trust you all the way?" Knock Out continued. As he said these words as he traced his finger closely in front of his eye down the vision of her form and stopped at her heart. She kept a firm eye on his as they once again studied each other attentively.

Knock Out moved his hand from pointing and flipped palm up it so that it looked to his vision as if he could grab her and squish her in his hand. He squeezed his hand once and then sighed and gave up. He knew he was acting too paranoid and he placed his hands on his hips, a common stance, Kirsten thought. He started chuckling.

"Well, at least you're not vomiting anymore. Are all humans as disgusting as you?" Knock Out said in his demeaning manner.

Kirsten just gurgled and flipped to turn the other way.

"Your species, so like ours except...well just not as advanced. Is there anything you can do that's not gross?" Knock Out started playing with the stairs of the platform when he realized he wasn't getting any kind of reaction from her. Part of him wanted to be friendlier, but his rude consciousness blocked his attempts at being amiable.

"Okay so, no? just, little gross, things?" He was getting nothing.

"Nah, uh, maybe you're not that bad..." Knock Out wasn't used to getting the silent treatment, save Soundwave, "you know you're not even half bad to look at, Ya know?" Knock Out, trying to dig himself out of the hole he made.

Kirsten frowned at the statement, amazed that she could get so emotional if so provoked. "Half bad?" she groaned. "That's rude." And she plopped her head down again.

"Ugh, you're making this hard, Come on!" Knock Out rolled his eyes.

"You haven't given me any reason to make it easy." She quipped back.

Knock Out's lips curled in amusement and he raised a brow, "Sensitive little thing aren't you. So... then...how may I make amends?" he said, raising his head proudly and offering her a hand.

Kirsten looked up at his extended hand, his fingers were sharp like Soundwave's. She would probably bet on the fact that he had two personalities that battled for control of his body, but for the meanwhile, she would rather go with the slightly less hostile personality.

"Well, since you're asking..." she shuffled free from the blanket and finger-combed her hair to the side, making it flow down the nape of her neck and over her right shoulder, "Maybe...I'd like for you to just trust me." She held tightly to her hair on her collarbone. Knock Out nodded his head slightly towards her and leaned in.

"Deal." he said. Kirsten extended her hand in amends and he took it and shook it gently. Her hand was engulfed in Knock Out's hand but she was surprised to find that his felt slightly different than when Soundwave had grabbed her hand that one time. And hesitantly...she again, was surprised to find herself comparing everything Knock Out did to they way Soundwave felt and did things. Interesting.

An uncharacteristic loud step from the Decepticon's top spy made his presence known at the doorway. Knock Out immediately noticed Soundwave as soon as the sound was made. He slowly let Kirsten's hand go and stood up tall again, pushing himself away from the wall. He raised his hands in surrender, "I didn't touch her, Soundwave, you can ask her yourself." he smirked and looked at her with a wink, "I was a good mech."

Slightly embarrassed, Kirsten shook off her sick feeling and got up off the bed and silently made her way to the work station. Whatever was making them butt heads, she was not going to get in the middle of.

Soundwave tilted his head down, secretly scanning Knock Out, wondering what was the intent of their contact. Knock Out watched him anxiously, for Soundwave had methods up every single sleeve, and those sleeves were numerous, to find answers. If it wasn't for Soundwave blocking the entryway, he'd be out of there by now. Soundwave was too dangerous for Knock Out to trick or stage his way through.

Kirsten had made her way to the top of her stairs where her workstation was and noted the deep interaction between the two mechs. They acted like wild animals competing for alpha-male status, so slow, and so silent, watching each other's moves closely. She could imagine if anyone of them made a sudden move, all would be over. The room was so silent, she was scared to even breathe with that unharnessed power building, fighting, competing...

Soundwave stirred and then stepped to the side so that Knock Out could let himself out. Knock Out lowered his hands and sauntered out of the room, not letting Soundwave get away with the last act as he turned his head slightly to him upon his exit and threw a studious eye into his visor.

Kirsten started to take bigger breaths once Knock Out was gone. The intensity in the room sat heavy and she started to open specific work documents. Before she could realize it, Soundwave had a hold of her left hand, the very one she'd use to shake Knock Out's with. Soundwave analyzed it immediately, his visor was so close to her body. Her heartbeats fluctuated between fast and normal, in one instance she was more comfortable around Soundwave than she had ever been previously. And on the other instance, exchanging physical contact between the dangerous mech distressed her ever so slightly. Soundwave depicted nothing on his visor, he didn't want her to know what he was doing.

As she stood and waited for him to finish, he layed her hand on top of his and took his other hand and wiped hers, as if trying to get a substance off of her hand. She expected his motion to abrade slightly, but it was moderate and determined. The short length of time that he did this, she stared into his visor, her head rocking with the motions of his actions. She studied the glossy, dark shape that hid his face and the inter-workings of the incredible indigo lines that pulsed with energy. He didn't seem to mind her eyes wandering all over his 'face', she was in fact, very intrigued by the fact that he let her. A storm rose in her belly, her breath hitched in her throat and tingles were running through her arm with his strokes. She unmindfully closed her eyes With the gentle strokes.

Soundwave finished his hand caress but kept his other hand sturdy underneath hers, appealed by her hypnosis. He scanned her brain, the state of her mind was relaxed and showed her pituitary gland functioning at a higher rate. He detected a high level of endorphins being released. Her endorphins were elaborated in a much more complex chemical fashion than the Cybertronian equivalent, but the idea was still the same, he deduced. He could make her do that?...

Kirsten's eyes fluttered and then opened slowly. She blinked sleepily a few times and then raised her head back up. She didn't realize previously that she was about to fall into a trance, but upon waking from it, she felt an odd sense of security and power when sharing a physical contact with Soundwave. She noted her sudden shift of feelings and wondered if it had anything to do with the plate in her wrist, or if it just had to do with her complex human emotions. She could make out her reflection in his visor as she looked into it, seeing herself, as he saw her. They slowly and simultaneously retracted their own hands while something powerful was exchanged without words, and without explaination.


	9. Little Spy

Ch 9: Little Spy

The following day after Kirsten's 'surgery', was the day she was to meet with Mech again. She woke up from her slumber and shook off her sleep. She sat on the edge of the bed and shook her light brown sun-streaked hair out of her eyes and over shoulder. She missed hearing the ocean out of her old apartment window and the smell of the salty air. She missed her surfboards, and her tan wasn't looking as saturated as before. So much had changed in such a short amount of time. She looked at her wrist, it looked perfect, as if nothing had ever happened to it. She guessed Knock Out was the good doctor he said he was. She yawned and then started to gather dirty clothes into the sack that Ann had sent her with, she would be needing more food and water if she was returning today as well.

Kirsten placed some clothes aside to change into and she began removing her sleep shirt. She removed her shirt completely and reached for the camisole she'd thrown aside and quickly snaked it over her head and just as she pulled it over her breasts, a large thud in the room could be heard. She looked up immediately and Soundwave was facing her, arms relaxed, still, unmoving. She stopped in her movement, startled to see that Soundwave was confronted with her bare, tan body. She slowly finished rolling the short down her toned stomach and didn't falter her gaze. She was so used to him not being in the room when she woke up that it didn't even occur to her to look.

Kirsten went on as if she didn't care if he was there or not, and started to pack her bag. Soundwave extended a tentacle and picked up an item that he had for her and slowly delivered it over the walls of her room. If it were up to Kirsten, he didn't look phased one bit by her semi-nude appearance. She saw the tentacle reach over the wall and come within grabbing distance of her, so she took the giant disc for delivery and then the tentacle retracted immediately and Soundwave went back to work just as quickly. She bit her lip in concern, she hoped that it wasn't as awkward to him as it was to her.

Moments later, she was packed and ready to go. She wondered if she needed to know anything before she went. She climbed her workstation stairs to get Soundwave in a better view. She had side-braided her hair and it flung loosely over her shoulder. She wore the same hoodie and leggings as yesterday and stood diligently on her platform, waiting for his attention. When he noticed her there, he looked slightly down and tilted his head.

"I was wondering... if there was anything I should know before I go." she said to him. His body slowly rotated to face her body directly and he reached down for her right arm. He held her hand palm-up to inspect the scar and make sure that it looked exactly the same as before. He then brought up the plate's transmitted data to make sure that it was still working. Kirsten looked at his screen with the data. Amazing that they fit so many applications in the small plate compared to as big as they were. Soundwave nodded toward the screen, everything looked fine and then he turned back to her. He pointed and tapped on her wrist and then pointed at the screen.

"I see." she said stiffly. "And you're sure they won't notice?"

Soundwave dipped his head forward and held his hand vertically to hers. She was confused at first, but then realized what to do. She held her hand vertically, opposite of his. He slowly pushed his hand forward, making her push back to make sure her wrist movement was normal. The muscles in her wrist performed normally and then he used his forefinger to poke at the tips of her fingers, making sure all of the nerves registering. She acknowledged with a nod each time he poked a finger. He then checked her range of motion by taking her hand and bending it backwards as far as it could go and then forward and down, flipped it and rotated it. It looked perfect.

All the while they were testing her wrist movement, she noticed that the armor that he usually wore on his chest was missing. And actually, she remembered it being like that yesterday too because she noticed his indigo striations more than usual. She thought she might have realized why they implanted the data tracker in her wrist, where was the bird?

Soundwave finished his test on her wrist and he nodded, satisfied at her and then showed her the way to the bridge through his visor and pointed to the doorway. Kirsten jumped down the stairs and then grabbed the sack and hauled it over her shoulder. She looked back expectantly. Soundwave stood where he was, not following. Kirsten was almost disheartened.

"Are...you coming?" she said to him out of disappointment and nervousness. He shook his head in denial. She was on her own when she walked out of that door, so she said the first and only thing that came to her mind at the moment.

"Well...see you later." And she began to walk out. "I hope."

Soundwave watched her turn the corner of the entrance-way and disappear.

* * *

Megatron and Dreadwing stood in the main bridge, Dreadwing stood ready to activate her transportation.

"Kirsten, I trust that you are ready to face our deceitful allies?" Megatron sneered to her without looking her direction. "Let me see your bit of Decepticon technology." He turned to face her and leaned forward as she held out her wrist. She turned it for him to see, rotating it and making sure he knew that it was functional and non-hindering.

"Good...Soundwave And Laserbeak both have more important duties today so when he proposed the idea of using you as his dispatchable project, you could imagine my distaste and skepticism in putting superior technology and trust in a despicable thing such as yourself." He leaned closer to her. "But being that Soundwave's reports on you are, favorable... do me a favor and prove me wrong."

Kirsten nodded in agreement and spoke softly, "I will, Lord Megatron." She had at least learned to call him as the high rank he was, even though it still sounded foreign coming from her lips.

"And one more thing, I want you to speak at me with confidence. Nothing good ever came from a weak mind, or a meek mouth." His voice boomed at her. She suddenly stood straighter and rolled her shoulders back. He was right, she lacked the right confidence sometimes, perhaps it was time to change that. She nodded with dedication at him.

"Ok." she said under her breath, not meaning for him to hear that. Dreadwing activated the ground bridge and she proceeded to enter.

* * *

Just as last time, guards were waiting for her at her arrival. She remembered Megatron's words of wisdom, nothing good ever came from a weak mind. Got it, she thought. She had to keep her wits and spirit about her today or else all kinds of things could go wrong. She held her head high with a renewed spirit and walked with the guards to the entrance of the secured hallway where the professor waited for her on the other side.

She walked through the metal detectors and, as predicted, set them off. Professor Alan nodded to the guards and they searched her, finding nothing. They ran the portable detector along her arm and it beeped going over the plate, the scar looked untouched. The guard rendering the portable detector remembered her from the last time and nodded her through.

"Kirsten! How is everything!" Professor Alan spoke with an uneasy tone of exuberance.

"Fine, glad to be back on land." she stomped her foot a few times to exhibit her meaning. She followed him to the main room.

"Do you have our delivery?" the professor asked.

"Oh, yes... hold on." Kirsten plopped the bag down and started going through it and got a red sweater with it wrapped in it.

"Fantastic! This is a very important one!" he said, handing it to another Mech scientist.

"Yeah... I am..um..." she tried to think of conversation words, but it had been so long since she conversed, she was at a loss for words. Soundwave definitely didn't fill that void. "I am amazed, at the ...the..schematics, of things. I don't understand half of it from a scientific standpoint."

"Well you don't have to, is the good news. All you've done is make it easier for us to make the world a better place. Isn't that great?" he seemed so overly happy that she was suspicious.

"Yeah.. I'm glad." Kirsten scratched her head. "Is there time for me to wash these clothes?" she referred to the sack of dirty clothes she brought.

"Yes yes, I'll have Ann take care of all that... where is she, that little bird..." he looked around and shrugged, "She's around here somewhere, but in the meanwhile, we need to review."

_Soon after..._

Kirsten was led to a conference room with the blinds closed, only a guard and the professor in there with her.

"Okay, while our scientists review the information you've transcribed, making sure there's nothing fishy in there... for obvious reasons.."

Kirsten nodded her head as if 'of course, the Decepticons could have changed a few things before burning it to a portable disc', and kept her cool.

"...while they're busy doing that, I am proud to say that I'm impressed with your work." he slid a pack of money over to her across the table.

Kirsten looked at the money with surprise. She didn't know she was going to get paid!

"That's for all your work and troubles so far. There's $3000 there, do what you want with it." she he sat back in his chair and smiled.

Kirsten looked at the money skeptically. She didn't want to look distrustful but it would look suspicious if she didn't take the money, so she reached for it. Upon taking the money, she felt a small vibration in her wrist but she stayed calm and collected as she stuffed the money in her lap.

"Thanks." she said. "I have a question for you..." Kirsten asked the professor, who motioned for her to proceed. "Well, it's about my parents, do they know what I'm doing?"

"No." the professor said nonchalantly, "They were told by government officials that you were selected to be part of a secure operation for the saftey of our country. They seemed to understand and don't think you're in any harm."

"... I was worried. I miss them." Kirsten lowered her head.

"Now now, it won't be too much longer that you are here with us, we just need a few more documents and then you can be free again." he smiled, a little too falsely for her taste, but she smiled falsely right back at him. "Excuse me for one moment." he got out of his chair and left the room suddenly.

That was unexpected, what did he leave for? Kirsten sighed and looked down at the money in her lap. The money could be a plant of some sort, magnetically charged to cause the strange sensation in her wrist. She shuffled through it with her left hand, not wanting to feel the vibration that she felt with her plate again out of nervousness, but that's when she noticed the small writing on the top of the first $100 note. She squinted to see it in the dim lighting...it read:

_Kirsten, we're aware of some spy technology the Decepticon ship has. You will find a pen and notepad taped to the underside of the table where you sit, write down all of your investigations there so that none of your words may be open to recording. As your secondary duty, provide information about any activity you may think important to us. Any information about their ship, their tracking devices or their location will be prudent to yours and our survival. Note any suspicious activity you've seen or heard on the ship that may be detrimental to Mech's operations. Rememeber, this is for your own safety._

Kirsten's face became red and sweaty after reading the note but she took a few deep breaths and calmed herself down. Confidence, she repeated, you know what to do. The guard in the conference room saw her read the note and then exited himself. She noticed their strategic exits, they didn't want to be present when she outed the Decepticons, to save their own asses. She imagined she was being watched from outside of the room, she wanted to see a blip of a red light anywhere, any sign of being recorded, but she figured, watching or not, she still had to answer the note. She took the pen and notepad from the underside of the table and began writing.

_I have not heard of anything strange, _she scribbled, _I am very secluded and Soundwave doesn't speak, I am sorry that I have no more information but I will keep on the look out even though I am treated as a prisoner with no contact. _

__Most of which...was a lie.

* * *

The rest of the day at Mech went smoothly. Ann had brought Kirsten a bunch of new clothes instead of washing the other ones. More hoodies and leggings. She began to think that she was being given Ann's own wardrobe out of convenience. She was kind of happy with the hoodies, they kept her warm on the cold ship. No complaints there.

This was the first shower Kirsten had taken where she could see herself in a mirror afterwards. She posed in front of herself and admired the extra bit of fat she'd lost over the past month. She was lean now, not that she had a lot to lose anyway, but she was happy with the unexpected results from canned soup every day. She went through the bag she'd brought in and found the undergarments and clothing to change into. While pulling out a dark blue underlayer tank top, the $3000 she'd stashed fell out. She reached down and picked it off of the floor. Something made her gut churn holding the money, her body told her something her mind didn't want to hear. She looked around the small shower stall and bathroom for any sign of cameras. When she felt it was safe, she began tearing up the money and flushing it down the toilet bit by bit.

Ann and Kirsten sat together in the on-campus cafeteria while Kirsten ate delicious food and Ann started checking off items from her checklist to send her back with.

"Ok, you have a brush, check! TP, check! Water...food...*mumble*..." Ann droned on with her feet on the table, stabilizing her chair on the two rear legs. "Oh! Tampons, check!" Kirsten nodded, knowing that she would need those eventually. She shoved another fork full of spaghetti in her mouth listening to Ann.

"Ok, I think I got it!" she clicked her pen several times and drew a happy face on her notes. Kirsten was amused by her happy-go-lucky attitude, and then felt sorry for her. She didn't know what her dad was involved with, she seemed like she had such great potential but working for the betrayers was like working for the losing team. She sighed.

"You ok?" Ann popped up.

"Um, yeah... just.. tired." Kirsten responded.

"Do they keep you up all night with their evil plots and alien slithering tentacles and wild slaying parties and their dissection tables and metal music drumming and chanting and..." Kirsten had raised a finger to her own mouth, silently telling Ann that she was getting way too excited.

Kirsten spoke to her softly, "No, they don't have alien music drumming and slayings and parties and ...where do you even get that idea?" Kirsten said, amused.

"I dunno, it's just fun to imagine. Are they really that evil though?" Ann asked back.

Kirsten thought for a second, she was a direct link to the professor, she wished she could trust Ann but she didn't want to take that chance, what could she say so that she'd be safe on both sides?

"They're just like humans, actually." she said to the teenager. "They're like us, with emotions, and they work as a team just like we do and they have jobs, just like we do."

"Wow..." Ann stared speechless at her. "but no dissection tables or sacrifices or guts and stuff?"

"Not that I've seen. I guess they could have gooey guts but nothing would give me a reason to think so." Kirsten told her. Ann looked disappointed after hearing Kirsten tell her that. Kirsten realized that Ann knew nothing about Mech's operation or the Cybertronians, otherwise she wouldn't have such fantastical ideas.

"So they're just normal?" Ann said in a low voice.

"Far from normal, but more normal than you'd probably think." Kirsten smiled at her and patted her shoulder.

"I guess that's pretty cool then huh..." Ann took her feet from off the table and sat normally.

"It's pretty cool." Kirsten continued to smile and then they finished their dinner and exited the mess hall.

"Excellent job on transcribing the last two documents, Kirsten!" The professor greeted her at the entrance to the room with the ground bridge, "These are incredible machines with superior technology that we an build with Earth's materials, good thing we have you on our team." he patted her back bluntly.

"Uh yeah, I mean, the pay's good...and I'm looking forward to the next installment." Kirsten said with fake enthusiasm, "I also look forward to seeing my parents again when this is done." she said honestly.

"Don't worry, you will." the professor said hastily, "By the way, how are they, the Decepticons, treating you?" a direct question.

"Normal." Kirsten said back.

"Normal?" he questioned.

"Not nice, not rude...normal? I dunno..."

"Like...passive?" he prodded deeper.

"Yeah."

"They don't suspect, as in, questioned you, as to what else you may be up to, have they?"

"I doubt I've given them any reason to think so." she looked at him innocently, "Should they have a reason?"

"No no of course not! Sometimes communication is lost and then things... are lost... in translation but..." he started to hesitate in his words, keeping from her what was actually going on, the things though, that she knew already. "But of course we're on good terms at the moment and you shouldn't worry! You're doing your job and that's all that matters." he patted her back again, "Good luck, until next time." and gently pushed her forward into the bright glowing light.

* * *

Kirsten emerged from the other side, back into the Decepticon's ship. She was slightly glad to be back, she couldn't stand the facade anymore from her professor, and the whole operation. At least when the Decepticons were going to do something evil, they admittedly did so without fabricating another mess. Megatron was there to greet her when she stepped through the light. Dreadwing stood behind him, faithfully. Soundwave was nowhere to be seen.

"Report." Megatron boomed. Kirsten looked up at him and opened her mouth. "Wait." he said. He tapped the edge of a metal table on the side of the bridge, he wanted to read her eyes to see how honest she was. She walked over to the table and a bridge drone picked her up and set her on the table.

"Better. Now, report." Megatron faced her with his hands behind his back.

Gathering her confidence like he said, she delivered her report with a louder voice than usual and while standing with her chest out and back straight. "Lord Megatron,..uh..." she stopped, unsure of what exactly to report on as there were so many facets to the visit.

Megatron waited patiently for her to speak again, he was legitimately giving her the benifet of the doubt. She focused her eyes and spoke.

"Lord Megatron, MECH suspects nothing but they asked me to spy and I said okay but I know I don't work for them and they tried to pay me but I think the money was fake and a spying mechanism was there and it sucked so I destroyed it all but at least the spaghetti was good-"

"Stop!" Megatron snarled at her. She was out of breath and panting. "Now...start from the beginning." When Kirsten started to open her mouth again, "...slowly." He emphasized.


	10. Knock Out is persistent

a/n: aww you're such loyal readers, thanks for all the comments and favs and **follows. I'm working this delicately...this may be the longest fic I've ever written! I've gotta get moving! -K ;)**

Ch 10: Knock Out is persistent

After Kirsten had finished her briefing with Megatron, she felt more loyal to the Decepticons than ever, mostly because the Nemesis was where she was currently occupied. She didn't want to admit to choosing one or the other, but the evidence was so clear to her that her heart couldn't deny it anymore. She had no choice but to choose survival, which was what she felt all along.

"How interesting of Mech to be so careless with their own chosen ally." Megatron said while he paced the bridge. Dreadwing, Knock Out, and a few troopers plus one insecticon watched him from the walls of the bridge, waiting for his commands. "We must make sure to strike when the time is right, we can't have them knowing of our falling allegiance. Those incompetent humans, I'll be glad when we can leave this planet and return to our own!" He clenched his fist and shook it. "Although, not too soon... we can't afford to break the ties with the governments of this world yet, we need their energon deposits." He lowered his fist and held his hands behind his back.

"I want both of you to speed up the mining process without detection, "Megatron said to the drone miners and insecticon, "I predict a fallout between us and MECH not far from now." And he snarled with his last sentence. The miners and incecticon bowed and exited the room and Megatron turned to Kirsten, who remained on the table.

"Kirsten, how long do you think it takes for your race to build complex machines?" He peered at her with his red glowing eyes, menacing to her gaze, but not as startling as they once were.

"Um..not fast." she spoke clearly and precisely, remembering all too well what Megatron would say if she were to come off as soft-winded again. "I..know...that um..the things I transcribed for Mech were more complex than I had ever seen before so, well, it takes humans more than a week to build a simple bridge, I'd assume it would take... longer...than..that?" she ended the sentence with a question in her voice and a shrug in her shoulders. "I'm sorry, I don't really know. They'd need to build it, test it, approve it, tweak it..." she motioned circles with her hands leading on to the fact that it could take a bit or a while.

"So what you're saying is that they more than likely won't have any weapons done before the end of the week."

"..Probably?" Kirsten said, still a little hesitantly, afterall, she didn't exactly know how fast MECH worked, but she DID know how long it took for construction to happen on her city streets.

"We know that MECH will strike at us via word the from many of the world governments but they haven't sent any sort of hint of a timeline." Megatron said aloud to himself, thoughtfully putting one hand by his chin and thinking. He turned to look at her, she was such a small useless thing, but he had decided her usefulness crucial to the protection of the ship and his crew. He hated putting his trust and time into her, he hated putting any kind of help out past the confines of his ship and crew. He felt like he shouldn't need it. But Soundwave had made his case loud and clear, 'efficient and organic'.

"We'll see what your little implant did for us while you were away, I'm sure Soundwave had a plan as to what he was tracking through you." Megatron glanced at Kirsten's wrist, and she looked down at it after him.

"I thought he might have told you." Kirsten replied to Megatron.

"He informed me of the basic functions, but Soundwave, as you may have noticed, thinks about things much deeper than what is so shallowly observed."

"Yes..he's..." Kirsten thought for a moment, "...interesting. Others seem to think very highly of him." She recalled the day the other mechs got out of the way for him, the way Knock Out succumbs to his ominous gazes, the respectful manner in which Megatron speaks of him. She wasn't working with just anybody, she was working with, Soundwave.

"Very highly regarded." Megatron reassured for her. "He's been a Decepticon by my side since the very beginning. I assure you, if one is deemed to be against the Decepticon cause, he will be the one to sniff them out and dispose of them.." he said sinisterly.

"That's..." he stopped and looked directly into Kirsten's eyes, "...why I'm surprised you're still here."

* * *

Before sending Kirsten back to her room late in the evening, Megatron had told her not to work on any documents until Soundwave returned. Lucky for her, she was ready for a small break. She had a night and half a day to herself after her return, so she slept well even though she wondered where Soundwave was. The following day, she wished she could Skype with some friends or her mom to pass the time, but she knew the laptop that was provided for her was strung with high security and blocks and things she didn't understand. It could access the internet but with limits. She had spent a few hours searching what sites she could access but finally got bored. She lifted her legs up onto the desk and leaned back in her chair with her arms behind her head and rested, but it wasn't long until her solitude was interrupted.

"Knock knock." she heard a low melodic voice from behind her. Turning her head over her shoulder, she came face to face with Knock Out again. He was leaning on the door frame with his elbow and another hand on his side. Kirsten's heart jumped at his sight, he was always so confronting and she wasn't in any mood to socialize with him at the moment.

"Well, are you going to invite me in?" he sarcastically asked.

"What if I say no?" she responded just as sarcastically. He smirked and walked forward to her platform anyway.

"Still so feisty..." he chided as he leaned in on her, resting his arm on the platform itself, "You're looking rather...confident today." He cracked a small grin.

Kirsten eyed him while she crossed both her arms across her chest.

"I like that, the silent treatment. Taking cues from Soundwave I see?" He chuckled a few times and then stopped. Lifting his other hand he looked over his hand and fingers meticulously and then scratched his chin. "You know, I remember when humans were actually terrified of us."

"Who says I'm not?" Kirsten responded.

"There you are." Knock Out grinned at her. "But you shouldn't be."

"Well do you want me to be terrified or not?"

"Well I'd rather you not be terrified because there are so many more things to be discovered between us." he winked at her.

"You can't be serious." Kirsten chortled a bit nervously, "Does Soundwave let you bother him in his office on a regular basis?" She started swinging the swivel chair side to side with her butt, amused by the rough communication between them.

"Of course not, he's not that interesting!" He rolled his eyes up and to the side, "And he obviously isn't much on conversation."

"I think he's pretty interesting," Kirsten responded.

"I'll bet you do." Knock Out nodded and gave her a cheeky grin. "You two share the same affinity for boring projects as much as the next door knob!"

Kirsten became agitated at his words. It's not like she wanted to do these 'boring' projects, her life depended on it! She pursed her lips shut and took a deep breath through her nostrils.

"Don't be mad, I could show you some fun things to do on this ship."

"But that would force me to endure your impeccable charm." Kirsten dramatically threw the back of her hand towards her forehead.

Knock Out chuckled, "You're right, you game?"

"No, you're not my type." Kirsten said as she went back to folding her arms across her chest, pushing her fingers against each other in a Mr. Burns manner.

"Incredible!" Knock Out said, distracted by being rejected yet again, "You're such a fussy little female. How about Soundwave, is Soundwave your type?" he said sardonically at her. "Yeah, I bet you like that strong, silent type don't you." he became stone-faced and lowered his voice as he talked.

Kirsten frowned and looked away from him. Knock Out moved his elbow and gave her chair a little nudge. Kirsten became off-balanced from the slight movement and steadied herself by placing her feet on the ground.

"Stop that!" she huffed. What was he trying to get at anyway, trying to woo her was the last thing she could think of him doing. She supposed that just like humans, the Cybertronians had different personalities, different needs, and different doting methods just like they did. Just her luck to stumble upon the Casanova of the ship. Interesting that even across worlds, two species could share such similar traits.

"Okay fine, I know we got off to a bad start at first.." Knock Out started to say, "..and truthfully it's been a while since we've been in close contact with a female, well I guess that's not including Airachnid, but she was a bitch, not a female, and then there's Arcee, ugh...she-"

As he rambled, Kirsten listened solemnly, putting her feet back on the desk to get more comfortable and tucked an arm in the other and rested her chin on a hand. Knock Out rambled on about the plight of the Decepticons on small communities back in Kaon, something about the abductions and the bounties of war.

"That's a pretty long war." Kirsten said out of the blue, not having listened to everything he said, but she got the general idea.

"Well..." Knock Out responded in a softer but still forceful tone, "yeah." He looked to her with a veiled expression.

She grinned sympathetically back to him.

As if on cue, Soundwave appeared at the entrance to the room. They both looked his way and Kirsten took in his form.

"Soundwave, just having polite conversation of course because I know that's what you're thinking." Knock Out said, standing up straight and brushing off his shoulders.

Soundwave was having none of it and pointed his finger straight out of the room as immediately as the words left Knock Out's mouth. Soundwave knew enough about Knock Out not to trust him too long with the human female, no matter how innocent the visit was. He didn't want him to spoil his assets. His long arm extended fully with his intent and Knock Out began to walk towards him.

"Besides, she told me she would prefer you over me anyway," He said and patted the side of his long bladed arm that wasn't extended.

Kirsten choked on her breath when she heard him say that.

Soundwave grimaced at Knock Out's extended hand and threatened him with a whirling tentacle that extended from his body. He had no time for Knock Out's stupid games. 'Go', he motioned, with a flick of his head, 'out of my territory'.

When Knock Out had left the room for good, Soundwave turned back to Kirsten and began walking forward. Kirsten was still stunned by what Knock Out had said, certainly Soundwave wouldn't believe that she had actually said that though, would he? She was aware of the fact that she may have expressed her comfort with Soundwave right in front of him but surely he wouldn't be the type to suspect anything, much less act on it like Knock Out would. But she wondered, what if he did?

As Soundwave approached her, her heart pounded, not in fear of him, but with insecurity of what he would think of her after interacting with Knock Out.

Soundwave looked at her behind his dark mask. Her and Knock Out hadn't exchanged any physical contact this time, so Soundwave didn't feel the need to interact physically. What he found odd was, the fact that he had even done it in the first place. He reminisced to just a few days prior when he stumbled across Knock Out the first time in his workstation. He wasn't thrilled with Knock Out to begin with, treating his property less than ideal, to his standards. Also, his intentions were clearly laid out the first time he mentioned her, he was not trustworthy. Though, he found it profoundly interesting that Kirsten could refute all of his advances, something that most Cybertronian females were unable to do. His respect for her rose, but, all assumptions aside, work had to be done. He received the data from Kirsten's implant and began to analyze it.


	11. Explorations

a/n: whew...Ouch...haha:) ~K

Ch 11: Explorations

Kirsten sat still and focused on the screen in front of Soundwave as he ran through all the data, all too fast for her to keep up with him. He typed away as the data scrolled up the screen. The lighted symbols reflected on his visor, scrolling with the screen as if his eyes that might be behind that visor followed the symbols directly into his brain. For storage. Kirsten watched the reflection on his visor, wondering, what exactly was behind there. The purposeful and mindful Soundwave, so silent, and so mysterious, called to awaken her curiosity as she let her eyes drift across the smooth surface of his 'face'. She decided to amuse herself to pass the time by observing her superior. He was busy analyzing, so a quick study wouldn't hurt, right?

For being at war for millenia, they didn't look like it. They were well-built, anatomically alluring, strong, things, organisms, males. In the company of giants, she thought, who could've predicted she'd be here. Her upper lip curled in fascination. She didn't mind Soundwave anymore, she had started to take a liking to him, the way he didn't ever bother her unless absolutely necessary and the way she had to piece together parts of his patterns to make out what he was trying to communicate from the lack of speech. He was like a big equation and she almost enjoyed trying to solve it. Her wandering mind slid her eyes up to the top of his form as she daydreamed.

As her eyes skimmed the sharp outlines of his visor, she took notice of the many small indigo visuals running the length of his helm and neck and shoulders. She was beside his left chest, sitting atop her chair so she followed his neck into the crevices of his chest where she could distinguish between his own body and his armor. She thought it was much like the layers of an armadillo with thick scaly skin but an extra shell on top of that. But the 'skin' in Soundwave's case was like a soft metal, emitting heat and vivid with energy. Upon closer inspection, the skin versus his armor was contrasted by the visual finish of each surface. His armor was dull, hard, and grey but his real body was shiny and fresh, almost to the point of being dewy and almost, just slightly, malleable.

Just another multi-cell organism who was given the gift of life through creation.

Kirsten was suddenly overwhelmed with wonder, they were amazing in person. Images and classrooms couldn't give her this kind of epiphany and she felt an edge of accomplishment. She almost forgot to breathe from her sudden manifestation, as if she was looking at the facade of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome for the first time.

The armor that covered his chest was smooth but scarred, much like the majority of his armor, especially on his arms. If she wanted to, she could reach out and touch the smooth plating that covered his torso, just above his working arm. And oh, how she wanted to, just for confirmation. Her teeth started to chatter with the vivacity that was beginning to run through her. Her fingers twitched with want, demanding a resolution for her hypothesis.

Soundwave, unaware to her curious desire, was in the middle of evaluating the new information. The small implant had tracked and recorded numerous things during her visit, blood pressure activity among the first to evaluate her moods. Magnetic tracking had been installed and recorded and had resolved the mysterious money quandary by capturing the heightened magnetic activity within the green bills. He evaluated it further by tracing the magnetic pattern emitted by the bills into a complex equation that could only lead to one thing. The money was counterfeit and had micro radio registries embedded within the fabric of the notes. The good news was, it wasn't a transmitter, only a recorder. Soundwave thought to himself about reasons: perhaps they knew that their technology couldn't transmit past the Decepticon's cloaking device, so sending her with a direct access, crude though it was, was their only option. Soundwave was surprised at their ingenuity but there was one thing that bothered him, where was it, and was it recording.

Soundwave's data evaluation took a different turn suddenly. The blood that helped fuel the power to the circuitry in her arm was overloading, sensory data was scrolling across his face as he watched the real-time live direct output dramatically change it's current state. He switched from past data to current data but nothing else seemed out of the ordinary. He knew she was right there beside him, but her blood flow indicated that her senses were out of control. He turned from the screen down to where she sat by his left chest, just over his arm. She was staring intently at his body, in a trance. She didn't notice him peering at her from above, so he scanned her brain activity.

Though he couldn't read her mind, he could detect the elevated levels of endorphins again and sense the tense muscles in her body. He noticed her hand quivering and her face flushing to the point of pinkness. What was happening to her? He couldn't trace the path of her gaze to anything important on him... but she was staring at something. There was nothing his body held ...except, maybe, wait, could she look through his chest and see into his innerworkings?

But wait, she hadn't the ability to do such a thing. But, could MECH have tampered with her like he himself did, untraceable?

No. That was crazy, humans couldn't see through solid metal.

Could they?

Soundwave suddenly raised his arm in defense, covering his chest from her eyes, assuming that it was exactly what she was doing. She blinked herself out of her trance and Soundwave backed away a step from her, defending his spark with his plated arm.

Kirsten didn't understand why he was suddenly defending himself against her, all she was thinking about was touching his armor. Oh- Could he read her thoughts now too with the circuitry? She must have done, or thought something that made him think of her as a threat. She now didn't feel comfortable moving, anything sudden and she thought he would make her last breath a painful one.

Soundwave dipped his head low, looking like a wolf ready to attack. His arm was stiff in front of his body, and he stood as still as a buck in front of the face of a predator. What was she trying to see into his spark? His memories, his vulnerabilities? He couldn't terminate her, he still needed to know what she did with that money. He needed answers. He showed the pattern of her blood activity on his visor, demanding an answer from her. What was she looking for? What did they do to you? He needed to know.

Kirsten studied the graph for a short bit that he portrayed to her. She sorted out the fact that she had acted dumb but she wondered why he would feel intimidated by a thing like her. Her lip quivered with fear as they exchanged silent and steady gazes. She eventually mustered all her strength together in her vocal chords. He demanded an answer, so the answer he shall get.

"... my intention wasn't to upset you."

Soundwave didn't budge, that didn't tell him what he wanted to hear. He visually questioned her motives with the spike in endorphins, the tampering of her eyes, her senses, anything that MECH could have allowed her to bring back as an operative to thwart the Decepticon activity.

"...wait, what?.." she murmured choppily, "Nothing like that happened..." her face flushed severely. Breaths seem to escape in waves of turmoil. "I tore that money up, flushed it. It's not here!" she panicked. She couldn't make the words sound reasonable in her head but as she thought them through, her mind spoke through her hands, "It was just a hypothesis...that your armor is of a different rigidity than.. yourself." She said sternly back at him, not believing that she had said what she did.

Soundwave halted his playback on his visor and he went blank. He slowly started to lower his defensive arm. Her eyes didn't divert, they stayed fixed on his face. He knew wasn't insane to think it, he knew humans couldn't see through solid material, but he knew MECH was innovative. Though he felt foolish to even think that she could. His sudden defense disappeared as quickly as it had set in on him and he stood tall and regal again. So, the little human wanted to just...touch him?

He took a step forward to come back to the same position he was in before he had stepped back and he faced her, directly. Kirsten shook with confusion and trepidation. Perhaps he couldn't read her mind anymore than she could read his and the communication between them had somehow become tangled in exchange.

No...He ignored her. Disturbed by the thought of MECH implanting something in her or sending her back tainted. He quickly scanned the rest of the data. Kirsten sat still for many more minutes after that, more relaxed in the chair but with a tinge of insecurity. She looked down into her lap, not wanting to upset him again. If he were to give in to her desires, it would make him look foolish, but if he were to make her feel awkward, she may not work as efficiently.

After Soundwave was finished reading what he had wanted to read, he turned to face her again, head on. She looked up. He decided to indulge in some experimentation.

Soundwave splayed his arms to the side as if to say, 'come at it'. She was trustworthy, he and Megatron had made sure to frighten that into her. She wasn't threatening in a physical way, being the size that she was. He questioned his motives though, he wanted to see her reaction to his invitation while also wanting to test the limits of her fortitude.

When she didn't move, he challenged her with a flick of his head. Kirsten didn't understand his game. On one hand, he didn't seem to want her near him. On the other hand, he was challenging her to take a massive leap.

He flinched slightly when Kirsten slowly got to her feet and walked to the edge of the platform where he stood.

Her head came just below his chin and in front of her, the massive, warm, anatomical structure of his chest. All she had to do was reach out two feet, and her hand would be on his body. What was she waiting for? She hesitated for a long time, building up the courage to actually go through with it. Was he testing her? Did she have any reason to feel in danger? Did he want her to touch him? She deduced in her head that every answer to her inquiries were yes. The latter was only obvious because of his invitational stance. Her eyes glanced at the work screen briefly, she saw her own blood pressure rise, and continue to rise. The burning fire in her stomach caught her breath in her throat and she consciously took a steady breath as her arm reached out in front of her and felt the warm cold of the metal finally touching the palm of her hand.

She had closed her eyes, savoring the moment in her memory, amazed that what she was doing was actually real. Her thumb twitched and her hand slid down slightly and then shifted to the right, her slight caress fueling inquiry from Soundwave's mind.

She was touching his armor but he couldn't feel it, only sense it through the magnetic energy that flowed through his body, connecting him to his armor. She continued to shift her hand right, heading straight for the edge of one of his armor plates. She knew exactly what she was doing, feeling the difference between his armor, and the real him. Soundwave justified the experience by knowing that he could use the extra information of her contact against his own enemies when the time was right to take on MECH. So Soundwave didn't stop her, he was challenging himself too.

She knew that he watched her with every intention. She was feeling the small air between them become static with energy and pulsing with waves of current. She let her hand slip fluidly through the break in his armor and her hand felt the warm, dewy surface, just like she expected. The new touch sent an unexpected sensation through Soundwave. He could feel her now, more than when she touched his armor. She was warm, like him.

Kirsten's thoughts were right. His real body was slightly pliable yet still very strong and impenetrable. It was so warm that she thought if she held her hand in the same place for too long, her palm might start to hurt from the heat.

The touch started to become too risky for Soundwave anymore and he became apprehensive. A threat she was not, but the matter of information she just received was not something she should share, ever. Even if she was tortured she could share such valuable information about their armor. He was foolish again. He retreated from his own thoughts and forced himself back into reality. Behind his visor, his face contorted in concern.

There was no time for this. They were about to be at war, again. He had gathered enough data from her visit to propose to Megatron a devious plan. He didn't think it would be prudent for her to interact with MECH any longer now that the Decepticons had stolen their high card. She was solely his assistance from now on. She had served her duty to MECH and now, she was to only serve her duty to him and the Decepticon cause. He decided that the previous visit to their operation was to be her last. If not her last, then close to it, they were getting ever closer to breaking the bonds.


	12. The Plan

A/N: I know I'm on a super roll! Probably won't happen again... If you read chapter 11 the day it came out before midnight then I suggest you read it again because I didn't like how it handled the interaction between Soundwave and Kirsten. I felt like it was rushed, so I changed some crucial parts. Many thanks to one reviewer, you know who you are;)

CH 12: The plan

"That's an incredibly dirty and backhanded plan, Soundwave." Megatron growled, "Are you sure you have the resources to pull it off?"

Soundwave nodded and pointed to the map that he had in front of Megatron on the screen. It was the potential MECH base where they were supposedly building their new Cybertronian weapons. But on the map, it was labeled as a senior citizens home in the bleak middle of Australia. Soundwave had sent contacts to the Australian government for access to confirm the home, all of which came back as a confirmation that yes, it was a home. What had alerted him to be weary though, was the fact that there were no visual confirmations, only schematics and building plans handed over. So Soundwave was still persistent in finding out why the energon burning levels had suddenly spiked there.

"And what if the location is wrong?" Megatron spoke to him with his hands clasped behind his back, pacing the floor. Soundwave typed in a few more things, portrayed a visual on his visor to Megatron, and shook his head side to side.

"So you're confident. Good."

But Soundwave, in the middle of shaking his head, held one slender finger up to tell Megatron, there's something else. He brought up on screen the level at which the burning energon was being emitted. Almost a mile below the surface.

"How interesting." Megatron stroked his chin and the placed both hands on his hips. "Can humans actually function at that level?" Soundwave didn't respond. Megatron took a glance his way and then his fiery eyes burned with revenge, "I think it's time to use race against race. Soundwave, I think we need a trustworthy human's advice." Soundwave nodded, and went to fetch their high card.

As Soundwave exited the bridge to retrieve Kirsten, Megatron stared blankly at the screen. Enlist the human, to solve the human problem. He had no doubts in his mind that she would tell them the truth, but by playing slightly ignorant, he could be sure to match Soundwave's theories with her own, and see if they matched, for approval.

Soundwave entered the room where Kirsten was busy doing nothing. Since they hadn't given her any more Mech duty to finish, she had to pass the time with mundane things. Currently, she was working on seeing how high she could stack her leftover soup cans. The vibration on the ground from Soundwave's entrance though, made them topple to the floor. Soundwave jerked to the side in defense of the loud noise and sudden movement. Kirsten realized his personal dissension of security and tucked her head into her chest and braced herself with both arms extended in his direction. A few cans rolled into his path and his head followed them down to the tips of his feet. Kirsten peeked out from behind her crouched shoulder. He lifted just the tip of his foot and let one can slip under the juncture and slammed it back down, causing a vibration that sent Kirsten to her knees. She braced herself on all fours when she fell and then felt the familiar coils of a tentacle lifting her by her waist and curling down her legs.

She was lifted into the air and turned upright, obviously this wasn't the time to play around. Soundwave meant business and so he took her to the bridge of the Nemesis and held her in front of Megatron.

"Kirsten." Megatron greeted her.

"Lord Megatron." she greeted back, dipping her head slightly. Soundwave took her and dropped her roughly on the edge of a simple workstation without too many buttons. She got to her feet and waited to hear what he had to say. He was almost twice the height of Soundwave and nearly twice the girth due to his muscular build. She took a deep yoga-type breath in and let it out slowly, wiggling her fingers in distraction as to what to do with her arms.

"Kirsten, what do you see here?" Megatron said lowly and intentional. He raised his head at the screen they were looking at earlier.

Kirsten looked at the satellite image of the compound, it had no labels showing, only the image. She tweaked her head and frowned in thought. It looked actually like an abandoned air base to her.

"It looks like an air base that hasn't been used in a long time." she said bluntly.

"Really..." Megatron said with a hint of actual surprise in his voice, "And what makes you think that?" he was truly curious as to what made her come to that conclusion.

"Well.." she started, remembering the place she grew up, on the outskirts of the city there were plenty of left over abandoned air fields from WWII, grown over now with grassy fields and weeds, hidden by nature but not fully dissapeared yet, "there's a long strip of greenish-grey right there," she tried pointing to it even though it was so far away from her, "and a circle, there..." she pointed again, "like a tower or something was there.." she looked at the top part of the building, but it didn't look as unkept as the rest of the grounds, "and the building, I guess, well, it's a building." She thought that was obvious. She lowered her hand and then waited for Megatron's response.

Megatron didn't respond right away, he curled his lips deep in thought and stared at the screen. The thought that an underground cavity for building weapons wasn't so far-fetched now. But the entrance certainly couldn't be right on top of it. There had to be another entrance somewhere to transport all the materials.

"Tell me Kirsten, does this look like a place the citizens of an older generation would congregate for socialization and residence?" Megatron asked her. Kirsten decoded his words into what she thought he meant was an old folk's home.

"Not really." she said.

"Yes...or no!" Megatron shouted, "Do not forget your subservient place, Kirsten." Megatron boomed at her after becoming annoyed at her ambiguous answer.

Kirsten felt the heaviness of the situation set in again. She hadn't been through any kind of military training or experience in her life, this is probably what it was like, and she hated it.

"No." she said firmly in a tolerable voice. "But...if I may..." she continued cautiously.

"Go on." he growled through his sharp teeth.

"If...we could zoom out and see the larger spec of where this is located, I could make a more accurate supposition." she spoke clearly and concisely to him. Megatron nodded and Soundwave zoomed the picture out so that she could see the splay of the land. There wasn't anything around it for miles. Kirsten searched the surrounding area, but there was no other sign of other inhabitants other than just the one lone road that lead to the building.

"What are you thinking?" Megatron asked her.

"My assumption seems confirmed by the surrounding of the area." she said.

"Why do you think that?"

"Because there would be no reason to have a place like that out in the middle of nowhere. Usually senior living is suburban or urban for convenience with easy access to city amenities, such as...hospitals." she added that last part in for good reason even though she didn't like thinking about mortality as a reason for location.

"Your presumption absolutely makes sense." Megatron said, "which confirms our theories." he smiled sinisterly, as he did often, and turned his head towards her, "Tell me, can your species survive a mile below the Earth's surface?"

"It's possi-yes." she said directly. "With proper materials."

"What kind of materials?" he asked.

"Um...oxygen maybe, delivery of food and water, light. It can get moist at that level so clothing..."

"Enough." Megatron stopped her. "So what you're saying is that there should be a cartel of supplies being brought to this undisclosed location on a regular basis."

"Probably." She was hoping that she was saying all the right things. Megatron glanced at her snobbishly for her menial answer, 'these humans and their ambiguous chat'. Megatron looked toward Soundwave and gave him a communicative gaze. Soundwave nodded to him and began working.

"As Soundwave searches for other possible entrances to this underground space, I will be the first to tell you that your duty to Mech is over by virtue of Soundwave's advice. They have backstabbed us too deep to trust anything they do anymore, tell me again though, how did your instincts tell you to dispose of their counterfeit money?" Megatron paced the ground in front of her, looking into the distance and then turning his red eyes at her.

"I assume it reacted magnetically with whatever Soundwave did to my titanium wrist plate, because titanium has no magnetic properties." Kirsten rubbed her thumb against her wrist unconsciously, "and then I didn't want to take a chance, so I tore it up and flushed the pieces down one of their toilets."

"You are surprisingly savvy to your surroundings," he looked pleased. "We'll assume that they will suspect something after that incident, when they figure out on your next visit that you don't have the money anymore, they will gut you. And even if you had the money, they should know better than to think we wouldn't figure it out based on our superior material manipulational skills."

"But I thought I wasn't going to return to MECH, I thought my duty was over?" Kirsten asked in concern. What did they have in store for her next.

"Yes, your duty to Mech is finished!" Megatron said with a swipe of his hand to reinforce his spite, "But you will be a crucial part in their destruction." Megatron chortled, "How does that make you feel, being a part of something greater than your species has ever seen, only to learn that you'll be a factor in deciding their fate?" He clenched his fist with glory and power.

Kirsten slowly lowered her head and started to pick at the old leftover pink nail polish on her fingers, what hadn't been picked off already. No, she didn't want to see anyone's demise, especially her own human counterparts, no matter how evil they were. She didn't like them, but she didn't want them killed. A sick feeling rose in her stomach, knowing she would had no choice in contributing to the Decepticon's plans.

"Let me tell you something, Kirsten." Megatron leaned into speak to her softly, sensing her dilemna. "I don't like your planet as much as the next foreigner, and we would leave if we had a reason to, and I don't think you understand why we're here." His tone was dark and throaty, as if he was speaking straight from the dark soul within him. "It's not to destroy your planet, it's to destroy our own kind, for our own conquest." He shook his clenched hand again and scowled. "But when YOUR kind decides to interfere with our operation for it's own interests...that's where we have to draw the line."

Kirsten understood. She understood the concept of war, and humans were good at starting them. Decepticons seemed just as experienced at it as humans did, and that created a perfect equation for conflict. She held each arm with the opposite hand, and looked to the side, she fought hard not to fuss about it and hold her tongue which flicked the switch of emotion in her.

"You have a strong mind and a loyal constitution." Megatron said, standing up straight again, "But it's your good heart that makes you too soft to be a decent Decepticon." he started walking from her towards the opposite side of the bridge room.

Kirsten trembled with contention. All the muscles in her body were tense, and she couldn't stop thinking about what plans they were going to spring on her. Megatron stopped walking and twisted his head slightly backward, "You know, they would kill you first if you returned without a plan."

She knew he was right. MECH probably never expected to return her to her home. She would probably never see her family again in the greater spectrum of things. She accepted her fate with two tears rolling solemnly down her flushed cheeks and she squeezed her eyes shut from the face of the world around her.

"What do I have to do..."

Megatron smirked when he heard the soft, whisper of a voice from behind him.

It was actually a simple plan Soundwave had cooked up, but it had required a distraction at their main base while they infiltrated their other base. She was to be the bait for distraction. An old technique, tried and true for a reason, because it worked. Soundwave had returned her to the gateway room and began research on his plan. Kirsten scuffled to her makeshift room to lament after Soundwave delivered her to the ground, but she heard a startling tapping coming from her platform. Soundwave impatiently demanded her appearance at his side.

She muddled toward him and up the stairs, her arms were crossed in front of her and her face, long. She stood, looking at the grey, hard ground. She wasn't interested in listening anymore. Her earlier enthusiasm had dropped like a brick through the floor and into the underworld. Even his glowing indigo lines didn't seem attractive anymore when she was in such close proximity with him. They had always made her feel warmer, since she missed the sun. She liked the light they emitted, but now, she hated it.

Soundwave flicked the platform with his long fingers, making her stumble, wanting for her to pay attention.

"Forgive my lack of enthusiasm." she said softly and sarcastically, almost to the point of not caring.

He leaned in to her, retracting an arm to threaten her if she so acted out again. But he didn't see anger or animosity in her face. She generally just looked miserable. He questioned her attitude with a small scan of her brain. Nearly no activity, circulation low. He showed her.

"Why?" she asked him, "Why would I not have motivation to carry out a task that would ensure my death?" she frowned at him. She looked with burning eyes into his visor, hoping she could make him see that this wasn't the ideal way for him to handle things for her. Soundwave saw the message, and he understood. She had no reason to carry out a duty if it was to be her last. She hadn't the same loyalty for that kind of action, no one did. She needed to be rewarded for her work, so in return for her duty, he could devise a way to guarantee her life. He nodded at her, conveying the fact that he understood her outrage.

She lifted her eyebrows and expressed tolerance in her gaze. A long, drawn out sigh relaxed her muscles and she sat, blank-faced on the edge of the platform, letting her legs dangle over the side.

Soundwave turned back to the screen and ran through ulterior plans. Consequently, she had an upper hand in this kind of arrangement considering the action the Decepticons would take. They would be much easier and efficient with her compliance. And if Megatron approved it, he knew it would be in their favor still.

Soundwave twisted to her form, raising a finger, conveying for her to stay there. He exited the room.

Kirsten took the opportunity to look at the screen he was working on. The symbols were complex and hard to read with the way he worked, but it looked like he was considering another device to be planted in the same arm. This one, much bigger and longer than her small plating. There was no way that MECH wouldn't notice this one, even if she wasn't suspect.

Unzipping her hoodie and using it as a pillow, Kirsten fell back against the platform's floor, Soundwave's warmth still drifted around her. The light green tank top wasn't much security against the hardness of the metal but, she figured she should be used to it by now. She remembered Soundwave's real body, hard but warm, stiff but malleable. He had realized too late in the moment his exposed vulnerability, perhaps why they felt necessary to destroy her along with the rest of Mech. She was held in limbo in her thoughts. She couldn't figure out if he trusted her or hated her still. His other actions such as telling Megatron her favorable work activity should have been some kind of consolation but the communication, as always, was lost between them.

Moments later, Soundwave reappeared, Knock Out following him.

"Alright, let's see." Knock Out said to him and Soundwave reached out his hand to Kirsten, coaxing her with his fingers twitching inward. Kirsten held out her arm and watched as Soundwave measured her forearm with his fingers with Knock Out's advisory eyes following his actions.

"It couldn't possibly fit like that, we'd have to break it in half. Which I can do." Knock Out said to him. He brought forth a long, dark, mechanical stick-like thing and measured it up against her arm. When Kirsten looked at it next to her arm, it was just long enough not to fit her radial bone length. Soundwave questioned the effects of the manipulation.

"Well, it might decrease the effectiveness of the instrument but it should be enough for her, there's not much mass to protect." he chuckled, "What should we do next, Soundwave, put her into that shell of a Cybertronian body we have lying around and call it done?" Soundwave was in no mood for his banter and he ignored his snide comments. If he wasn't a doctor, Megatron would have disposed of him long ago he knew. His attitude was less than ideal and his loyalty faltered sometimes.

Soundwave resisted the urge to throw him out of the room, he needed his expertise, not his lewd critique. Soundwave twirled in his direction, showing Knock Out what would happen to him if he continued his ludicrous jesting. Knock Out may have pushed it too far with Soundwave this time, but he fell back into his rank after the threat was carried out.

"Fine..." the word rolled slowly out of Knock Out's mouth as he surrendered with his hands.

Kirsten noted the superiority that Soundwave had over Knock Out. He would probably have never caused her any harm if he were to answer to Soundwave. Knock Out walked forward again after he had stumbled back from Soundwave's advance and took a closer look at the mechanism that he extended towards her again.

"I can break it here." Knock Out said, pointing to a point in the instrument, "and then power it with uh... let's see.." he turned to the work screen and started searching.

"This artery." he pointed to the screen after he had brought up an image of the human circulation system.

Soundwave displayed a chemical composition: HB-Fe4=35%

"I know, it's risky. Unless humans can run on energon, but I doubt that's possible." Knock out responded to his inquiry. Kirsten had a foreboding feeling that whatever was going to get implanted in her, was not going to feel good.

"See, the biggest different in our liquid is..." Soundwave let Knock Out take Kirsten's arm from her, and he looked it over. "Human blood needs to transport oxygen, energon doesn't." Knock Out lifted her arm up like an experimental project and then prodded at her skin without consent. Kirsten jerked back at his actions but he held tight to her arm. Knock Out growled.

"Let me cut you so I can show him." He said non-nonchalantly.

"What?!" Kirsten stammered, "I'm sure he knows what you're talking about!" she jerked her hand back and he released his grip on her. His fingers scraped the surface of her skin and it became pink with agitation and she held her arm close against her chest.

Soundwave reached out his hand to her, wanting to see Knock Out's correlation, but without his obstruction. Kirsten didn't interact harmoniously with Knock Out, but he knew she would for him. Kirsten extended her arm hesitantly.

Knock Out sneered, "Well aren't you the gentle giant." he scoffed through his teeth. This was just the reason Soundwave wasn't comfortable with Knock Out using his things, he was much too careless. If only he treated other being's things as his own, he'd make a decent trader.

Soundwave splayed the examination across his visor. Running the mechanism on hemoglobin instead of energon would also alter the effectiveness of it but...to its advantage based on the earth's atmosphere. They just needed to find a way for the instrument to accommodate the oxygen because if they didn't, it could rust inside of her and poison her blood stream.

Knock Out tapped on his lips with his long fingers, deep in thought.

:Ti: Soundwave displayed.

"Hmm... titanium? Yes, use what we already know works." They problem solved together for the first time in a long time.

"I can extract titanium from our alloy." Knock Out thought deeply and scratched his head, "I guess...what if I reverse the chemical characteristics of our metal, extract everything but the titanium and replace it with carbon and then re-coat it with electroplated zinc and, voila!" Knock Out looked smug at the idea. It would work, Soundwave nodded.

"Don't worry, it won't poison you, but the implant WILL hurt after surgery." Knock Out said to her, looking at her horrified face. "I'll get started on the extraction and manipulation, give me some time though, it will take a while and I'll let you know when I'll need," he looked into her eyes, "the patient."


	13. Let me tell you a story

A/n: So this chapter got kind of long, oh well! If you haven't noticed, they have to move along slowly. As I've said in previous chapters, I fear an OOC Soundwave. But then I think, well, having a Soundwave romance is already OOC anyway so what the hell does it matter?! Hah. Sooo, some of the 'history' used in this chappie is brought from TF Prime and the wiki site that told me stuff from the comic I think (I haven't read the comics). And then I also have my own interpretation. I really enjoyed writing this chapter, thanks again for so many great reviews, favs, follows! I appreciate it!:)~K ;)

Chapter 13: Let me tell you a story

"Why in the name of cybertron do you need to change the plan of action, Soundwave?!" Megatron burst out to him when Soundwave stood in front of him, needing for him to approve his changes. Soundwave bowed before him, reassuring his loyalty but also accessing the situation for him. When Soundwave stood up, he showed Megatron why he needed to change his plans, because she wouldn't cooperate otherwise.

"I don't care if she will or not, wipe her out of the plan completely then!" Megatron swiped at the air with his arm and clenched his fist.

Soundwave shook his head, it wouldn't be that easy then. He showed Megatron why it would be simpler to just use her as a front in order to infiltrate the base in Australia at the same time, plus, take down the east coast base too.

"Ugh.." Megatron rubbed the big, long plates above his eyes, "Implant more Cybertronian technology, a forcefield generator, in such an undeserving creature!" He sat in his big chair and thought. "I suppose she isn't that undeserving...she has made our job quite easier hasn't she..." Megatron admitted softly so only Soundwave could hear him. Soundwave nodded in agreement.

"Soundwave..." Megatron said neutrally, "Do what you have to to get it done, but I'll be the first to warn you.." Megatron got up from his chair and walked a few steps toward Soundwave and raised a sharp, pointed finger at his face, "Your trust in a human of this stature is frightening. If for any reason she emits an air of treachery, you make sure and see her terminated..." His words were low and guttural. Soundwave's interest in the human made Megatron apprehensive. He saw several situations, many he didn't like arising from the private interactions between the two of them. Best to remain silent about it though, just in case Soundwave proved him wrong.

Soundwave dipped his head low to Megatron and turned to walk back to his station. He had conducted so many tests to assess her trustworthiness, it wasn't her loyalty he questioned, it was her confidence.

He contemplated her overall progress with Knock Out and Megatron both. He was even somewhat surprised at how well she presented herself at her last encounter with Megatron. She had no problem addressing him as 'lord' and spoke with spirit, and corrected herself when she needed to. She had come a long way but she had a long way to go too. He hoped that the forcefield generator that was to be implanted in her arm would give her even more confidence. Though, her greatest mark of progress was when he challenged her to share physical adjacency with his person, and she complied. She must have known how easy he could have terminated her, or how easy it would have been to trick her. She somehow trusted him, so why shouldn't he return the favor.

* * *

Later that day...

Knock Out had communicated that the extraction and replacement of the forcefield generator would take two days. Soundwave didn't worry about the time frame, he knew they had enough time to carry this plan out for even weeks to come. Upon approaching the gateway room though, he heard a conversation happening in there. He couldn't pick up any Decepticon audio waves, only the human's. Before he entered the room, he stopped and stood in the doorway, discreetly, to see what she was planning by herself.

"Okay, this one's for the gold..."

"But can you do it?"

"I can't guarantee I'll come back alive, sailor."

"But...it's a storm out there!"

"I know... but it's my duty!"

"You don't have to do this..."

"But I must!"

She appeared to be talking to herself at a below normal level. She was carrying a scrap piece of metal up the stairs about half the size of herself. She looked like she was struggling, but making it nonetheless. Soundwave watched secretly during her odd episode.

"Well, little lady, this is where the cookie crumbles." she seemed to say in one voice.

"Oh but I can't bear to watch!" she said then in another voice. She dropped the metal at the top of the stairs and tapped it with one foot over the first ledge, testing it.

"Watch history being made, my friends! I must save the world today..." and she put both feet on the metal scrap, "...By surfing!" she then leaned forward and tilted the scrap piece diagonally down the stairs and it started dropping it's nose until the whole piece, with her on top of it, skid down the steps.

She moved fast and before she knew it, she hit the bottom and the nose hit the ground and she went flying forward but tucked herself and somersaulted several times before she stopped face up, laughing hysterically. She could barely breathe through her fit of laughter. "Oh shit.." she managed to softly say to herself, "You're crazy." she covered her face with her hands while still laying flat on the ground, "Cchh, it was a successful launch, but one hell of a landing. Over." Her laughter died down and she put one hand over her belly and one arm to her side. She rolled her head to that side of her arm with a lush smile on her face, and that's when she realized she had an audience.

Soundwave couldn't figure out if she had lost her mind or not but he dare not tread any closer until she had her wits about her. He cocked his head to the side, trying to understand her motives.

When Kirsten saw his form, she scrambled to her feet and brushed herself off. Her adrenaline was running high from the ride and her breaths were short and shallow. She looked to Soundwave cautiously, neutrally, hesitantly while she started to blush profusely. She sheltered her forehead and face with a hand in embarrassment and walked towards the stairs, stepping over the downed scrap metal.

Kirsten thought she was in for it now, with Soundwave around there was no play time. She really only hoped he hadn't caught her acting out her imagination by herself. She walked up the stairs, not daring to cast any glances his way out of pure discomfort. Her face still felt very flushed as she sat in her chair and just stared at the screen of the laptop.

Soundwave didn't know what to make of the situation. It was obvious that she was trying to have fun, but at what cost? Losing her mind? This could not continue.

He finally walked forward, picked up the scrap piece of metal and crumpled it easily in his strong hand. He made just enough commotion for Kirsten to express interest. She turned her head just in time to see him toss the crumpled metal into the corner of the room. She flinched in her chair with a muffled "Ungh!". Her mouth was agape and her brows furrowed. 'What! No ! That was like...the perfect size!' she thought to herself but didn't have the guts to say it. She slumped back in her chair upset and kicked her feet up on the desk, crossing her arms in front of her.

Soundwave wasn't ignorant, he had made her angry, and he knew it. Anger usually spawned confidence, sometimes impulsive behavior, but at the least, room for a different kind of cognitive thought all around. Her soft, malleable mind could probably be trained within a week, afterall, he did see her adaptability early on. To have a trained human for covert operations such as this could prove to be useful. It would be even better if she could be brainwashed somehow. Megatron would never approve it though. And...as attractive as brainwashing sounded, he decided that it wouldn't be the best option for someone like her. Independent thought such as hers was the characteristic that helped him solve the problems he needed assistance with. She was much more useful being a free-thinker than a mindless drone like the rest of the crew. She just needed a little intimidation at times.

Kirsten wondered what Soundwave was thinking at the time. He was standing very still for the last few minutes, not working or moving, just, standing there in front of her, staring at the blank computer screen. She looked up with her eyes through her lashes at him, wondering what was going on with him. He first crushed her makeshift board and then turned himself off somehow. Maybe he was lamenting, she hoped, but probably not.

Suddenly, both of their attention was distracted by the screen turning on in front of them, Knock Out's face showing into the room.

"Soundwave, are you busy?" he said. Soundwave twitched himself out of his thoughts and walked forward to the screen. "I need a blood sample from the human. Only a drop, not much so don't frighten yourself out of your knits now." He said that last part to Kirsten while looking her in the eye. She acknowledged him by lifting her upper lip into a discrete snarl and looked away from the screen so that he wouldn't see. But Soundwave saw it. Occasionally he felt the same way, but he couldn't portray the same emotions that she could, that anyone could, and sometimes glad of it. Soundwave nodded to him and cut off the screen.

Behind the glossy visor, he slyly hid a grin. He looked down at her and showed her a map of the ship leading to Knock Out's operating room. Kirsten's eyes widened as he showed her how to get there.

"By myself, you mean?" she said to him. He gave her permission with a dip of his head. She got to her feet and mindlessly stretched her legs, mentally preparing herself. "Why?"

All acknowledgment he gave her was lifting his arm and pointing out of the room. He was trying her courage, seeing how she responded, again. She planted her feet firmly on the ground after descending the stairs and hesitated before she walked out of the room.

"What if he tries something? You're aware of his suggestive advances." she turned up to him, frowning slightly. Soundwave shook his head side to side and showed her an image through his visor, a live recording straight from Knock Out's operating room.

Seeing this made her relax slightly. Soundwave would look out for her, he couldn't afford to lose her trust at this point in the game. He lifted a finger vertically in front of his visor, attempting to say that she shouldn't speak of it to Knock Out. Kirsten understood, assuming Soundwave, being the ingenious spy that he was could probably access anywhere in the ship just by reaching out to signals and visuals.

Soundwave trusted her not to say anything, but it wouldn't be detrimental if she did and severed her allegiance. It would be just another deceptive day in the Decepticon battleship and he'd find another way to see and listen, just as he always had.

Kirsten glanced back once more before leaving the room, making sure Soundwave saw her leave in the right direction.

...

Kirsten stood alone in the long corridor, taking a deep breath, she started walking intently. The small red lights from the top of the passage made the path look more eerie than she remembered. She physically shook herself free from the corrosive thoughts in her mind and lifted her chin slightly, renewed in her gait and certain with her actions. She turned down the second right hall and counted the doors, seventh on the left. Two Decepticon drones turned another corner and headed directly toward her. Her heart skipped several beats but she didn't falter her step. They seemed not to be affected by her presence and upon passing each other, they both stepped aside to the sides of the hall and allowed her to smoothly pass through them, and then they all kept walking, determined to their destination.

Kirsten felt a surge of giddiness through her bones, 'how cool was that!' she thought. Soundwave's little human asset, 'hah'.

She counted the seventh door and turned to enter. It had taken her all of two minutes to walk there. Knock Out stood in front of a wall full of his tools, looking to choose one of them when he heard her footsteps enter his domain. He turned and looked surprised.

"Wait, where's Soundwave?" he questioned.

"It's just me." Kirsten responded, continuing to walk toward him and his operating table. Knock Out squinted to her, wondering why Soundwave would let her come by herself. 'Whatever' he thought, and turned to his wall of tools and chose his finest blade. He knelt down to her and measured the blade to her finger.

"Not too big..?" she squinted his way.

"Relax, it'll just be a small prick, I only need a drop." he said, taking her finger in his hand and squeezing the tip of it. "Soundwave wouldn't be too happy if I botched you up anyway," he said in a manner that assumed irritation. "In...any kind of way." he smirked at her and then laughed softly. "I kid though, calm the fuck down." As he held her finger he could feel the muscles twitch under his touch.

He prodded the blade at her index finger, making sure he had filed it fine enough to not cause too much damage. He wasn't satisfied. He got up and walked to a grinder, filing it some more. "But I do find it unfair that he who which came upon the opportunity to enslave a better than average specimen of a human wouldn't act upon it's rewards." he brought the blade close to his eyes to inspect it and let it down to file it a bit more. "But who am I to say what is acceptable and what is not." he shrugged.

"Aren't you underestimating yourself?" Kirsten said to him. Knock Out turned to look at her. "I mean...look at you and look at me, large, small, you could enslave whomever you want if you want the truth, you know that."

Knock Out grinned at her.

"Well, it's not about enslaving, and it's not that easy." he said while polishing the blade and inspecting it again. He was pleased with the size. He walked back over to her with the blade and another mechanism and kneeled over to her again. "Megatron wouldn't allow such a thing, Soundwave is an unusual exception. He is Megatron's most trusted comrade, he's been at his side from the beginning of the war!" he rolled his head dramatically, a slight bitter tone in his voice.

'Tch'ing' through his teeth and shaking his head, Knock Out continued his drabbles, "He probably wouldn't even be so high ranking if it wasn't for his face." He prodded her finger with the fine blade. Before she knew it, he had poked it at her finger and blood began to seep out of the wound. She flinched but kept still. It was like giving blood at a donation center, she kept telling herself.

Knock Out retrieved the other mechanism that he held and placed it on her finger. It sent a small electrical current through her body but not to the point of being bothersome. Kirsten thought about his random statement about Soundwave and she was begging to entertain her curiosity.

"What do you mean by..." she questioned. "..his face?" She expressed her curiosity to Knock Out above her, asking for more. Knock Out shrugged and glanced to her eyes but then quickly looked away.

"Well it's just not pretty." Knock Out said matter-of-factly.

"Well not everyone can be born as lucky as you, can they." she said rather sarcastically to him, trying to appeal to his narcissism.

"Oh, but he wasn't born that way..." a crooked grin tugged at the corners of his mouth, "He became that way." Knock Out chuckled in his throat, as if to ward off the deep tone he was setting. "In the gladiator pits of Kaon, Soundwave and Megatron were fighters, gladiators, even before the war, and they shared a battle in which they would both emerge victoriously from their damages."

Kirsten listened with enthusiasm, forgetting the fact that Soundwave could listen and see them.

Knock Out continued, "Soundwave had nearly beaten Megatron, or then known as Megatronus, in battle but before he could finish him off, Megatron threw a trick punch and then came from the other side," Knock Out curled his fingers in front of her for dramatization, scratching at the air, "and ripped Soundwave's face into shreds with his bare hands."

Kirsten peered wide-eyed at him, her face aghast with dismay, "So how were they both victorious? I don't see..."

"Well Megatron is Megatron, and Soundwave, by losing one of his eyes for good and some of his other senses, enlisted the assistance of technology, and thus was born the Soundwave we know today. Better, faster, creepier." A blip from the screen behind him caused him to glance back and then he removed the mechanism from Kirsten's finger. "But you best not mention to Soundwave what I told you. I think he prefers to be discreet about himself." He walked back to his screen and started going through the code, her DNA sequence.

Kirsten took the cuff of the hoodie she wore and pulled it up and over her hand so she could soak up the rest of the blood and put some pressure on it.

"Damn." Knock Out said, turning slowly to her, cowarding slightly, "that thing in your arm...is probably still transmitting data isn't it."

Kirsten looked at her wrist and smirked slightly, "Yeah, probably." and looked smug up at Knock Out.

"Ugh, Soundwave...you beast." Knock Out said, chuckling nervously, and then turned to face the screen again, "We're done, You can go."

"Okay..." Kirsten said and then turned to exit the room.

She heard Knock Out call out to her as she turned the corner, "And give Soundwave my sincerest apologies!" But he said it too melodically for her to think he meant it sincerely though.

She repeated Knock Out's words in her mind over and over again. 'Damn' she said to herself, she could have said so much more, but always after the fact. She mouthed to herself and whispered, "Well it's not that pretty," she mocked in Knock Out's tone, responding to herself in a Cali-gangster-style chuckling inside her stomach. "Faster, creepier, but better than being dense and arrogant" she thought of many things she could have come up with but better to have not said them for sure. She mocked their encounter all the way back to the Gateway Room where Soundwave was still working.

She entered the room and watched for his movements, wondering if he would regard her after knowing that Knock Out spoke about him to her. Soundwave immediately lowered a bladed hand to her and enticed her forward with his fingers. She nodded and then climbed the stairs and waited as Soundwave finished what he was doing on the screen and then turned to face her.

"Yes?" she questioned first, "...sir?" amused at herself for saying the latter word with a renewed self-confidence. He coaxed her closer to the keyboard with his fingers again and when she was closest to his massive keyboard, he opened up schematics on the screen for her to see.

It was the plan of attack for the day they took their revenge on Mech. He pointed to her point on the map, and then pointed at his. She was to be at the main Mech base and he was going to be in Australia, at the base where it was assumed where they were building the weapons. Troopers were being went to the east coast base with Dreadwing and it looked like Megatron and Knock Out were staying on the ship.

"So, I'll be alone?" she panicked and Soundwave nodded. He showed her a schematic of what was going to be going on with her. As everyone was deployed, he would be bridging her to their base on business, but be delivering explosives instead of a disc. By this time, the implant should be functioning and she would get caught, obviously. They would be sure to try and evacuate the building while leaving her to fend for herself. The explosives would just be a facade though, the real threat would be taking everyone from their posts and not being able to get the other transmissions coming across from the other bases that were to be simultaneously attacked. And then that's when the troopers would bridge to her location and start firing.

Kirsten's body jerked in response to the amount of destruction, and hung her head sadly. Soundwave tapped the keyboard for attention and she responded by looking up. She was to activate the forcefield generator and find a stable structure to hide behind, or underneath. He pointed to a small emergency stairwell at the northeast corner of the building, head there, he pointed to the location, and wait.

Kirsten started to feel the butterflies rising in her stomach, she felt her esophagus spasm and she almost heaved, but she took a deep breath and blinked several times, trying to dissipate the feeling.

"Then what?" she asked, nearly hopelessly, shifting uncomfortably in front of the screen. "Just...walk away? Unscathed? Go home?" She placed her hands on the keyboard to balance herself from just falling to the ground, her knees feeling weak underneath her.

Soundwave thought about it for a brief moment, and then turned his head towards hers and pointed to his chest, communicating to her that he'll come find her when he's done doing his own business. Kirsten peered at him quizzically.

"That doesn't make sense... you'll come all the way from around the world? Why not this guy, Dreadwing, why not Knock Out? They'll be closer and faster, Right?" The truth was, she didn't want to wait that long, she didn't want to be out more than she needed to be, it scared her.

Soundwave pointed to Dreadwing's symbol on the screen and shook his head. Then, he moved his fingers slowly over Knock Out's symbols. Resting over his name for a few moments, Soundwave curled his fingers inward and then they twitched slightly. Knock Out probably would botch up the job. He'd let his narcissism get in the way of the goal, which is usually how things turned out when he went into the field. He'd be better off serving his station in the Nemesis and patching up the troopers. Soundwave immediately shook his head after a brief pondering.

"So you'd rather fly 10,000 miles from remote location to remote location than have someone mess up your plans? Sheesh..." Kirsten shook her head in disbelief.

:better than being dense and arrogant: Soundwave replayed her own words back at her.

Kirsten stumbled around to peer at him in surprise. She covered her mouth with her hands, and her face became flushed with a glowing red hue. Still, she shouldn't be surprised, afterall, she knew Soundwave was all around her, at all times. But she couldn't help thinking that he had heard all that she had said in the corridor on her way back from her visit with Knock Out. She rubbed her entire face up and down with her hands, the hoodie's cuffs coming slightly over her wrists and she leaned her butt up against the large keyboard.

"Oooh...geez." she said, bending over with a slight chuckle tickling her throat, "You know...I don't usually curse that much." she straightened back up, throwing her loose hair behind her and she held a hand in front of her body with the other on her hip, "But damn...he makes you just wanna..." she grimaced and squeezed her hand, "Ugh." she dramatized by shaking her fist while clenched.

Kirsten rubbed her face once more before slapping her palm down onto the yoga pants she wore and tipped her head leisurely to Soundwave. She couldn't help but try to hide the mischievous smile that was tugging at her cheeks. Soundwave watched her try to not smile at the situation but she got the best of herself eventually and began laughing softly, she covered her mouth to muffle the sounds.

Soundwave understood. She had defended him somewhat with her words, which was a respectful thing to do. Out of obligation or not, she remained loyal to Soundwave as an independent drudge by being the free thinker that she was, making mindful decisions. He hadn't expected her to be a good worker, and a good judge of character both in the same body, and for that, he cracked a very tiny smirk behind his visor for her sharing the same sentiments as he did, for it indeed was slightly comical.

She looked very different than she had just moments before, replacing her grim, forlorn face with an explicitly bashful, glowing pink face. The small snickers that escaped her mouth were liberating, coated with expressions of comfort. For the first time, Soundwave noticed her as a living, breathing creature rather than just a laborer that he controlled. She was a real girl, with emotions like them, who could be amused at something small or big if the circumstances were right. Her laughter was a primitive reaction, raw, and unrefined. It provided an emotional context to conversation, signifying acceptance. She had only exhibited fear and conformity and just a little curiosity thus far, but he was beginning to see that there could be more to be shared between the two of them than just work.

But not wanting to waste anymore precious time, Soundwave enveloped the brief moment in his memory and quickly returned to a business mindset, not daring to venture any further down the other path of jest so soon.

Kirsten's chuckling had died down to a small smirk and then when that finally dissipated, she turned around again to peer at the screen. Soundwave had opened up the schematics of the pseudo bombs she was to wear on her big visit and was ready to brief her on how to approach the guards.

"Okay...moving on..." Kirsten whispered and sighed.


	14. Lost in Space

A/n: This is a great step for me! I can't plot anything! It's like choosing what to have for lunch, wtf there's so many things to choose from! I'm tryyyying! but muahaha, I like suspense too;)

If it seems like a servant/superior sort of thing, then no...no servant. I want for Soundwave to look upon her like a tool, not servant. You know, like your mouse:D That gets explained a little more here. I think. Is that different? haha.

I've always loved to overuse commas. How else do I illustrate a dramatic pause? Seriously? Any writers know?

Also, I LIKE discovery, but instead of human/mech fics where the human discovers that 'oh the robots are so like humans!' attitude, I kinda want to turn it around and make it like, 'oh! the humans are so cybertronian!' kinda...eh..for...whatever.

Also, I'm making up Lasorbeak's history.

Thanks for all the reviews, favs, follows, you guys rock!:D I loove constructive criticism too. I'm not a writer, I'm just a fan. ~K ;)

Ch 14: Lost in Space

Soundwave made his rounds in the ship, checking to make sure things were going to plan. Weapons were being charged, repairs were being made. Even though the human's technology posed no threat to the Decepticon armor, the fact that they had started to build Cybertronian weapons actually did pose a threat.

It was all a trade-off. MECH got their wish to share the alien technology for their own agenda. The top world governments get to share Mech's advantage of having the weapons for political pull. And it came around full circle, the Decepticons get to have a free-ride in air space and land consumption for their energon mining without interruptions. But all that was going to change once they rebelled against MECH.

Who would have thought that the world's top governments were corrupt and greedy, allowing the Decepticons a free ride only to betray their cooperation in the circle. But it was too late to take back the technology now, they needed to play ignorant until the right time, that's where the Decepticons always had the advantage. By not playing keen on Mech's operations, they were allowed to confirm their theories without being discovered, all in the meanwhile, plotting to strike against them.

Soundwave felt a surge of energy suddenly and headed straight to the nearest computer on the bridge. He started typing considerably fast. From his chest, two tentacles reached out to connect to the servers below. He was focused and centralized all of his communications exertion into one big mass of power to break a code being transmitted from one point in space, to another. Soundwave caught it, and stole it.

"What is this, Soundwave?" Megatron walked up slowly from behind him, "Another interception from our adversaries?"

Soundwave nodded and started decoding the bits of broken information from the energy burst.

"This may be a crucial part of their plans to down our ship, wouldn't you think?"

Soundwave kept working and swiftly pieced together the bits and pieces of broken code. The result was a very random sequence of numbers and a portion of...images? Soundwave was taken aback by the letter's message. He brought up the information on-screen so that Megatron may look at it.

"Interesting...can you decode it?" Megatron said flatly to him. Soundwave stood very still, calculating the amount of time it would take him to decode the sequence of numbers, his forte. He came up with a reasonable time plan, but decided not to show him just yet. He was unsure about the images. They were illustrations of indigenous plant life, leaves, organized in a fashion that was not indicative of any kind of pattern stored in his memory.

"Soundwave." Megatron insisted. "I assume with your delayed response that you are indicating that this won't be an easy task." Megatron walked to stand beside Soundwave, an unspoken action of respect that Megatron occasionally exchanged with him. Soundwave lowered his arms from the keyboard he typed away at and stood noiseless at his side. He could decode half of it in a short amount of time. It was the other half...

Soundwave knew that Megatron hated commanding the assistance of Kirsten to pass their own boundaries, but that's the reason why he had convinced Megatron to keep her aboard the ship, for these very reasons entirely. Soundwave was good at what he did, numerical patterns and aligned sequences, and she was good at what she did, everything that Soundwave couldn't do in a reasonable time length. Sure, he could decode it, but it would be a gamble to take for the amount of time they had left. There was a .0000000001% chance that he'd get it right on the first try.

So, Soundwave did what he knew would work the best. He would take care of the number sequence and Kirsten would take care of the organics.

Megatron peered at him from the side, looking down at Soundwave's large shoulder blade. Their race had come so far, they had lived a long time, and he wasn't about to give that all up now. He regretted his decision to partner with MECH. He regretted a lot of the past but all he could do now was move forward, with a renewed vision for their future on Earth. That's just how they operated. They were treacherous, powerful, and elusive.

Megatron spoke to Soundwave so low that it was almost inaudible, but to Soundwave it was like a megaphone. "Soundwave. You have the interests of the Decepticons in your processor and I trust that your judgment will be an accurate representation of what we stand for. You and I both know that the Decepticon foundation is rebellion for a just cause. While I must put aside my demonization of the human accomplice we've adopted, in reality, she represents everything that we do. Rebellion against the faculty of the Earth and those who want to betray us." He chuckled deeply, "What better way to ensure our rebellion than to keep employing her assistance. It will send a message to those who are synonymous in misleading us in the future."

Soundwave turned his head slightly towards Megatron, acknowledging that he was listening but made no other sounds or movement. He needed to tread delicately around him to make sure he understood, allowing for Megatron himself to figure out Soundwave's needs. It was just like when he employed the help of Laserbeak. She hadn't always been his pet, animals on Cybertron were regarded as lower lifeforms. She was a stray, lost in the battles on Cybertron. Megatron had forbid any non-Decepticon identities on the ship. But, when they had found each other and he saw the advantage he could have with her sharp optics, superior reception, and acute communication for a small beast of her type, he had convinced Megatron otherwise. Never had an animal been labeled a Decepticon until she came along, and Soundwave proved her as a useful tool. He provided security for her, and treated her well in return for her services.

Now, he wanted to do the same with Kirsten, she was a useful indigenous tool with advantages. He finally lit up his visor and showed him the progression of their adaptive performance in the past, using other planet's resources and cultivation, it's what they had always done. Earth seemed to only be more uncontrollable than previous planet's they had visited, a lot more advanced than most, but unrefined in their ways.

"Fine." Megatron said to him. "But I again warn you." His fiery eyes were glowing dim, "You must already know that humans are not like animals, she is not like your beloved Laserbeak. She is like us, not a pet. She has thoughts and feelings and..." he paused for bearing, "..she is also female." Megatron admitted his true reason for his apprehension. They were a lot like the Cybertronians in ways that Megatron didn't like agreeing to, more so than he'd like to expose. Megatron closed his eyes and let out a long, thoughtful sigh, and that was it. He walked away in silence, hands clenched behind his back.

That's all Soundwave needed to hear. He bowed behind Megatron and began his stride to the gateway room. Megatron didn't say anything that he didn't already know, but to ensure Megatron's trust and approval, Soundwave needed to feel like he let Megatron get the advantage by making the decision for him.

When he returned to the gateway room, he found Kirsten collapsed on his large keyboard, half on and half off, as if she had suddenly experienced a brief episode of narcolepsy. He approached cautiously, but she stirred and moaned softly. "Mmph...Ten foot swell...perfect lines..." She wasn't asleep, she now looked as if she was in mourning, falling to her knees dramatically slow.

She heard Soundwave's footsteps behind her and turned her head quickly to him. 'Always, always, has to catch me in a stupor!' she thought and got to her feet.

Soundwave noticed she had something open on his screen, it was a map of the Pacific Coast and a report on wind, waves, and direction. He had heard of this 'surfing' things that humans did, among their many activities to waste time. No, it didn't look interesting at all to him, skimming the surface of the face of a wind-induced water current for the sake of going back out and doing it again, and again.

Soundwave erased the screen and brought up the message that he and Megatron were discussing. He pointed to it and then turned to her. Kirsten lifted an eyebrow at the message, she had never seen leaves as a code before, seriously?

"Wow..." she whispered and her mouthed twitched slightly. She wasn't good at identifying leaves, she could barely tell the difference between a roma tomato and normal tomato at the grocery store.

"This is the message?" she asked Soundwave, almost not believing that Mech and the UN was serious. Soundwave nodded his head, barely visibly. His shoulders raised and he let out a slight vent from his neck and then his shoulders relaxed back down. He then raised one long arm and pointed to the leaves, circling them with a motion.

'Egh...' Kirsten whimpered in her mind. Soundwave crossed his arms in thought, and looked back to the screen. This was definitely going to take some time, and a lot of luck.

Yep, it was going to be a long day. Soundwave split the message into two parts, one for him, and one for her. She stepped quickly to her laptop and the message was being downloaded to her own files. She bent herself over and placed her elbows on the small desk, moving the mouse around the screen to zoom in at various places.

Soundwave was actually somewhat interested in the way she would approach this puzzle. He maneuvered in such a way that he could see her computer screen and her eyes at the same time he dipped his head low.

Kirsten was almost touching the screen with her nose, trying to get the best view possible. Resting her chin on one of her hands as she lifted her straight legs onto her toes and back down again, feeling the stretch in her calves, she felt his presence beside her. She glanced her eyes his way but then looked back at the screen.

"Do you want me to explain what I'm thinking?" she asked him. He acknowledged her with a gesture of his head. "Okay...um..." What she really needed was some time to think it over, she had no idea where to get started. "Well leaves are... uh...so they're foliage of trees and plants..um.. they..." Kirsten suddenly had a huge mind block. How was she supposed to think with Soundwave's face so close to her?

"Light...they do photosynthesis...the-," she broke up, she couldn't work this fast. "You know..." she held up her hands in surrender and turned to face Soundwave's face, right in front of her own, not above, but in front. She jerked at seeing her own face so closely reflected in his glossy visor, but also being this close, she could see all the buffed out scratches in it, she continued, "I need some time to...think about it. It's really hard, with you there." she spoke her words delicately, trying to choose them in the most calm way possible.

He didn't feel that it was necessary to leave the beginning of the organic creative process. He tilted his head to the side and back, he indicated to continue with the quick thrust of movement.

"Honestly, I may need to mull this over and do some sketches and notes before I even begin to start." She furrowed her brow and ran her hand over the desk gently, kind of leaning on it since she wasn't in her chair.

Soundwave, just with the simple flick of her hand over the desk, was reminded of that very first time she stood at his large keyboard, so enthralled to use it, and so remarkably interesting to watch. Looking at her from a different perspective now, as a cognizant creature and further from being a, thing, his memory documented those simple mannerisms as characteristics.

"But I promise to show you my process when I HAVE something to show you." she spoke neutrally to him again. She stared at him, because he wasn't moving, he was staring back at her, or so she assumed. She didn't know where his eyes, or eye, or whatever, was directed behind that visor. She was perplexed and it was a little unnerving. She looked down at the long sleeved shirt she wore and roamed over it, wondering if there was something on her. She looked down to her pants but nothing looked especially interesting, her shoes may have been untied but that was just because she hated wearing shoes, but it was too cold to wear sandals. She didn't have any sandals up here anyway.

'Damn it!' What was he doing!? She was agonized by his deliberate watching.

Soundwave was also annoyed by the fact that she wouldn't just start working, what did it matter that he was there or not? It was inconveniencing for him to watch her too, but he wasn't able to convey the message correctly to her, not this time. There were no graphs to show, nothing that he could process that would tell her of their shared inconvenience and his irritation with her delay. He just...couldn't figure out how to convey a message to her that wasn't business. And it started to frustrate him.

Megatron was right, she was more complicated than Laserbeak. He couldn't persuade her to work faster even if he could intimidate it into her, processors and brains didn't work that way, in fact...

...He had an epiphany...

...in fact, they slowed progress when intimidated. If he were going to let her work as a human worked, then he needed to back off. But he didn't want to, his thirst for information collided with his need for an efficient work period and they competed for priority in his own mind. Suddenly, he felt an overload, a surge of emotions taking hold of his thinking process, he'd never been stumped by himself before, not lately at least, not since becoming one of Megatron's top commanding officers. Which decision held top priority? Learning new information, or abiding time wisely? Either way, one would surrender to the other and cause a set back. His fingers resting against the ground curled, leaving small scratches in the metal behind them.

Kirsten couldn't hold her gaze any longer, she turned away from him and bent over on the desk again, poking her nose into the light of the screen. Perhaps while he was silent, she could work. She may have reacted differently if she had been aware of the battle taking over Soundwave's processor.

Kirsten noticed the air around her feeling warmer. Soundwave's close presence emitted the warmth, she knew that, but it was stunningly more temperate than normal. She was nervous to ask permission to change into something cooler with him watching her so closely, if he was going to be there for a while.

But now she was completely off topic, she wasn't thinking about the problem anymore, she was thinking about how hot she was in her long-sleeved shirt which made her think about changing which made her think about how Soundwave would react, which made her think about how she wasn't thinking about what she was supposed to be thinking about at all!

Soundwave watched with fascination, the way her face changed colors right in front of him, usually meaning that she was under some sort of stressful emotion. It was a color that meant many things but adhered to the same basic principles that she move moved inside somehow. Was it him that was doing such things, he wondered. He had never documented her colorful episodes with Megatron or Knock Out. She was impressive indeed, and she understood him and his efficacy, and bided her time with him. He soon began to wonder why he was thinking about her so often.

Megatron's words came to him the moment he noticed that his processor was off-topic. The fact that she was female. That, he noticed, only recently. Anatomically structured, humans shared cybertronian character aesthetics more so than he realized, even the gender difference, like most animals, beings across the boundaries of space, it was just the direction of science and evolution. Were they really created so far apart across the universe? It didn't seem likely with the attributes they shared. Primitive though it was, Soundwave found himself not thinking on task. MECH had given him a whole new outlook on Earth and the creatures in it's habitat, less one creature. This one.

Knock Out seemed rather more competent than himself suddenly. He figured it out quicker than Soundwave. Well, not for long, Soundwave didn't like the idea of anyone figuring out new information faster than he, that's why he was who he was. Best to not let him become wise to Soundwave's impeded manifestation though. But, he found it strange, that all the technology he had incorporated in his long lifetime, had no less than limited his ability to find the simplest of all observations, the primitive comprehension of attraction, at the front of his doorstep.


	15. To Roam Forever

~K ;P

Ch 15:To Roam Forever

"Okay, I think I've got something..." Kirsten said to Soundwave. With Soundwave's looming, Kirsten had unzipped her hoodie and put it to the side. The camisole she wore was just enough to keep her comfortable with his heat emanating around her. Soundwave moved from his place by his own workspace to hers in one quick motion. Three hours had passed since he had started observing her creative process but only ten minutes since he had to start working on another quick communications project with Dreadwing down on Earth. He had just wrapped it up. Soundwave knelt by the platform, resting his fingers on the ground and silently resting a jointed knee between them. He loomed close to Kirsten's small notepad and looked over the top of her bare shoulders.

Kirsten couldn't figure out if Soundwave had no emotions or feelings, or if he was just really good at concealing them. She almost wanted to get a rise out of him sometimes. She wanted him to react. Especially now that her place on Earth's future was to be protected. She didn't feel like she was being used anymore, not by MECH, not even by Soundwave. Something had shifted recently, something that she couldn't put her finger on, but she could feel it. She felt treated like a person, because recently she had actually had a choice in the matter of circumstances. Soundwave had responded to her despondent feelings of being put in harm's way at a large cost to her, but a small cost to them.

Somewhere behind that visor was a sentient being. Kirsten took her hair and pulled it over her right shoulder so it tumbled down over the right side of her chest and sat herself cross-legged in front of Soundwave on her platform. She tapped her pen against the paper, paging through her notes, preparing herself to speak. Soundwave had witnessed her jotting random things down and drawing the pictures of leaves and then typing at the computer to search for things that needed explanation or clarification, but he couldn't follow the random thoughts that she worked with, it just wasn't logical enough for him. Nothing that she did actually connected to the last thing and left so many open ends to the solution. But regardless of his acceptance of her methods, the fact remained that she had succeeded in the past, and he had no doubt that she would succeed now.

"Ok, so.." she started, "There are five types of leaves, right, they share some similarities and then the things they don't share, I noted them on this other sheet, I don't care about that now right now, things like their location or whatever..." she moved her hands about while she talked, it was the most he had heard her speak in one breath. He also realized why Megatron had such a tough time understanding what she was saying half the time. What was 'whatever' supposed to mean?

"So then the characteristics they share, because these patterns have to have something in common, right? Like in my field, some lexical similarity is shared between germanic and slovic and romance languages so actually when I go to translate something, by seeing the similarities, is much easier to figure out and..you know...do it."

She shook her head at the way she was explaining it to him, hoping he understood but she didn't know if she was doing a good job. She pointed to three leaves with her pen, "So, these are all fern leaves, all these species grow in tropical regions, but unfortunately they're not species that grow on the same continent... which needs more explanation so I'm taking this.." she pointed to a note she made of the Australian continent and it's related fern, "and using the information we already know, trying to relate it to the others..." she huffed and blew her bangs out of her face with her breath, "and then I'm going to try to see if their scientific make-up has any kind of pattern, and then after that, I've got a hunch that I'll need to re-order them in some other order to find the significance of the number five...but you see it's like...a back and forth kinda...thing?" She maneuvered her hands over her lap, making a gesture of back and forth.

Soundwave took in everything she had said, even the parts of her hand movements breaking up the space around her, it seemed connected to what she said. Soundwave often used his hands and arms for communication, knowing that it was part of his body language that he could use to exchange information with. He mocked her from behind his glossy silicon faceplate, her physical mannerisms were almost as random as her thought pattern. How opposite she thought than him, but still, the end result was the same, successful.

Kirsten tilted her head toward her right shoulder, letting her hair extend down further past her bosom. Without the salty, humid, air she was used to, her hair wasn't as wavy as it usually was and seemed longer. She leaned back on her hands while keeping her legs crossed. She tucked her neck into her shoulders in relaxation, preparing herself to ask Soundwave for a break.

She spoke with uncertainty, "Mental exertion can sometimes be as challenging as physical exertion for us, I am not sure if you guys experience the same thing but, I'd like to take a small break," Kirsten said to him, looking at him slantways, "..if that's okay with you."

Soundwave knew what she meant. Thinking deeply could be taxing on the Cybertronian processor too. He nodded to her, indicating that it was fine to take a break. He showed her the same graph of thinking activity and alertness that he had shown her before, but also added an extra level referring to mental state too.

Kirsten chuckled modestly, "I won't go crazy." she smiled into her shoulder, "I could have two days ago, but...it's better." She was astounded, here she was talking casually to Soundwave, as if they were some kind of comrades. She didn't deny her favoritism to him but her fondness had grown since he took measures to ensure her safety.

Soundwave was tracking her blood levels, they were very normal. He shifted on the knee he was kneeling on and rested one long arm on his leg, using the other arm to point at something. His gears had shifted, he would patiently wait for her to re-coop, but in the meanwhile, his quest for knowledge continued.

Kirsten tracked Soundwave's hand with her eyes, following it to her chest. Soundwave made two straight lines, just millimeters from her skin, tracing the light lines from her neck to the top of her camisole where they hid underneath the fabric. Kirsten flushed at the close contact with such a sensitive part of her, but kind of enjoyed the feeling it arose in her belly.

"My tan lines?" she said uncharacteristically fast in response. Soundwave tilted his head forward, listening closely to her explanation. They probably didn't serve the same purpose as his own lines did. But he wanted to know, what purpose they held. How did human lines compare to his own? His were enhanced metal alloy that were supposed to be greater conductors of electricity and heat, able to sense and track different levels of atmospheric changes and toxins. He showed a depiction of an ambiguous human form through his visor and illustrated her two light lines down her neck and chest and labeled them as such.

"No, they're not sensors if that's what you mean, well..." she thought about pigmentation and the sun's effects on it, "...I guess they can be like a sensor, kind of. Skin changes color when exposed to sunlight," she grabbed a portion of her arm and pinched it slightly, examining her own tanned body like it was a new piece of clothing.

Soundwave nodded, well that explained the high levels of melanin he detected on his first examination of her.

"So, this is where my bikini usually is, so that part isn't exposed to the sun a lot." She outlined with her fingers the triangles of her breasts where the bikini would cover and then waved her hand at her hips, where the bottom portion would be.

Soundwave was very intrigued by the bio-forms their bodies took on as part of their own protection from the elements. The subconscious part of his mind though, kept referring back to Megatron's words, 'she is also female'. It just kept reverberating in his mind and he couldn't say it over and over enough for him to completely understand why it was so important. Certainly they could share physical accord such as beauty and the physical artistry of one's creative make-up through their species. His eyes were squinting suggestively behind his emotional shield. He may have found her...attractive. He knowingly developed a subconscious predatory instinct. He now knew why Megatron had warned him so solemnly, he was way off task...

..but...it felt so good.

It felt incredible to free his mind from his work to focus on things that were pleasing to his mind, females in general, were pleasing, something he had long forgotten a memory of. And the fact that this particular female was sitting comfortably in front of him, exposing her neck, whether in a suggestive or non-suggestive manner, it was enticing to him.

He reached out to her again to touch the light lines that ran down her neck and chest. He wondered if this was the same sensation she was feeling when she took the opportunity to touch him. Kirsten watched him reach forward once more to her neck and when she felt his finger rest softly against her neck, she looked in his visor. His finger traced slowly down her chest toward her center, she felt that soft burning feeling arise in her abdomen again as he continued his slow, delicate touch down her chest. He hesitated at the juncture of where the light skin dove under the fabric of her camisole before continuing down, imagining where the line lead down her breast. Breasts, similar, yet different in their species.

When Kirsten felt his hand hesitate, she lowered her eyes to his finger without moving her head, trying not to move suddenly and wondering if what they were doing was right. She instinctively closed her eyes in reaction to his gentle pressing finger against her chest and his wrapping another finger delicately around her waist. She breathed heavily with anticipation and taboo feelings, how did Soundwave make her feel so vulnerable and delicious with just one stroke of his finger, but in just the right places.

Soundwave's mind was riddled with conflict. His body reacted differently than what he was wanting, what his mind was saying, but he had another voice speaking to him, changing the direction of his actions, something primitive and innate that sparked the sleeping senses in his body. He lowered his head deeply while he held the small side of her body, feeling his pulses of energy grow louder and faster. He didn't like this, though he liked it. This didn't help the Decepticon cause at all, so why was he doing it? He was allowing himself to swim in the luxury of this provocative feeling that had arisen throughout him, and he knew it wasn't right and that he had to stop.

Though, it kept conflicting with that one big reason that his innate biochemistry screamed at him for, it felt so good to be turned on. Affection, felt, good.

Troubled, he raised his other arm from resting on his leg and violently grabbed his other hand, physically curling his own fingers off from around her and holding his fingers curled into a ball. He crouched slowly away from her. Kirsten's eyes opened as he was busy trying to remove himself from her, as if his body was two sides of different personalities. She felt nervous suddenly, not wanting to make any eye contact with him. He had held her in some kind of tender grasp that she wasn't expecting, and she had liked it.

Soundwave backed away from her, rising onto his feet, slowly taking one backward step after another until he had removed himself from the room completely. He wondered if those feelings had been there all along, was it why he couldn't stop her when she reached out for his armor? He tried hard to control his body as he stood in the corridor in front of the room, he tried to speak out but couldn't, he tried to move his hands, but he clenched them together to control them.

Kirsten finally lifted her eyes toward him, looking for some kind of sign, anything. He dipped his head menacingly from the corridor and his body was still and crouched. She opened her mouth and took a deep breath. If she knew the little about Soundwave that she thought she did, it was that he wasn't too happy when he lowered his head like that. She immediately got to her feet and ran to the keyboard panel and pressed a button, closing the door between them in an instant.

She breathed a sigh of relief and slid with her back, down to the floor and rubbed her head to remove the tingles. 'What just happened..?' she asked herself, a little scared and a little excited. She sat, leaning her back against the ledge of where the keyboard was and placed her elbows on her knees and sat in silence with her head resting in her balmy hands.

From the corridor, Soundwave finally unclenched his own hands and lowered them to his sides. He was glad that she had closed the door between them. Out of sight, out of mind. He figured it would be wise to let her work on the project in peace for the rest of the day, he had.. other things to tend to anyway.


	16. Empowerment

_a/n Feb 22, 13- Sooooooo I re-wrote this chapter...I have taken away ALL OF THE SMUT and turned it into a proper love story, not some cheap b movie romance;) HAh... anyway, sorry if you came back for it, but it's long gone. I'd like for my readers to actually indulge in the romance plot rather than the sticky content. Thanks for your understanding you all are AMAZING!_

_~K ;)~_

Ch 16: Empowerment

Soundwave worked at his bridge workstation for the rest of the day while his processor cooled off. He hadn't the courage to go back into that room and expect to control himself after what had happened. He needed a distraction, anything would do. There was no way a small human was going to get in the way of his loyalty to Megatron, because, it would mean his head. He would lose his rank, or worse, lose his reputation over his allegiance to the Decepticons. He did have a high status to maintain, and all could be lost if he let himself lose his concentration. He had held her affectionately, and he had enjoyed it. He wavered inconsequentially this time, but he knew he would take the opportunity to do it again if he didn't find out some way to distract from the thoughts, and it would only get worse.

But...why not let himself indulge? Nobody had to know. She certainly wouldn't say anything, and if she did, who would believe her? He hammered the workstation with his fist once, venting his frustration through the physical abuse. This is why Megatron was the leader of the Decepticons and not him. This is why Megatron had won in the gladiator ring, and not him. This is why he had empowered himself with technology and advances that no one else had. He didn't want to be a slave to his feelings, to his emotions. He had worked so hard to reach the prestigious status that he was meant for, and to throw it all away for the primitive urges and barbaric feelings that had been awoken from within him, was not to be looked upon lightly. He had to do something about it immediately, for the last time he remembered this happening, it was a struggle to regain himself. He tried to make logical reasoning as to why it wasn't right. He slammed his bladed hand against the keyboard again.

"Soundwave, you seem very tense." Knock Out had come in from behind him quieter than normal. Soundwave ignored him, continuing his work without looking phased.

"I just came from the Gateway Room." he smirked.

Soundwave immediately spun around to him, crouching forward in defense.

"Psh, relax, I didn't touch her!" Knock Out's voice raised at him, "You should feel rewarded that I regard you so highly." Knock Out laughed snobbishly. Soundwave thought about it, if Knock Out had the same urges, then the feelings weren't so foreign and abnormal. But Knock Out was different, his loyalty wavered, he had schemed with Starscream to destroy their own master, he could never stoop so low as to compare himself to Knock Out, ever. Soundwave pondered Knock Out in his silent mind, did he know anything about how Kirsten had just made him feel?

"Well since you weren't there, I assumed you were here." he said casually, "I needed to return this to you, I'm done." He held up the Resonance Blaster. Soundwave relaxed his arms and went to take the weapon from him, but stopped shortly of it. If he took it, it meant he would have to return it to the gateway room and he wasn't ready to do that just yet. He pointed his arm towards the corridor, communicating to Knock Out to return it himself. He then turned back around and began his work again.

"You want me to just leave it in there? With that human just having free access to it if she so desired?!" Knock Out was perplexed at Soundwave's sudden shift of authority on his assets. He usually scolded Knock Out for using his stuff so roughly and never recharging weapons after use.

"Oh I get it.. you're teaching me a lesson, fine. I'll take time of my completely busy schedule to find your recharge dock and do you want me to polish it too?" he said sarcastically at Soundwave.

Soundwave turned his head to Knock Out's face and nodded, while also depicting an image of his logged duties for the past three days, nothing.

"I am too rather busy!" Knock Out waved back to Soundwave in his boisterous tone, "I'm in the middle of doing **you** a favor if you haven't forgotten!"

Knock Out and Soundwave both knew that he didn't have to be present at the time of the extraction, it was a waiting game. Soundwave turned back to his screen and continued his logging. Knock Out gave up and shook his head. He headed back to the gateway room where he could hopefully get some respect.

Kirsten was sitting at her chair with her notepad in her lap, feet on the desk and a can of soup in one hand and a spoon in the other.

Kirsten had spent hours just examining the message, tracing the patterns and jotting notes down. They had not used pictures before, only symbols, numbers, and languages. This one was a little harder to decode than the last two but her brain could process slightly quicker just because of her practice. 'ugh..' '...phosph...ph..fuck...um...ferns...um...ph..' she stared at the screen, reading the same lines she had written over and over again. Oh yes...it had been a long day.

She re-drew the leaves several times in her notes, trying to list more common themes other than equatorial region. She looked at the screen and looked at her notebook and then at the screen and back and forth until she made herself dizzy.

"Fuuuck." She murmured to herself while scratching at bits of notes and changing arrows and directions of words.

Knock Out suddenly sauntered into the room. Kirsten jumped at his entrance and then realized it was Knock Out, who was there only three minutes prior to his second visit.

"Soundwave seems tense today." Knock Out said non-nonchalantly and tried to push different panels of wall around the room. "Big project?" He smirked.

Kirsten turned the pen in her fingers and pursed her lips while glaring at him from the side. Knock Out found what he was looking for as a panel in the wall opened and revealed a long cord. He took the cord and plugged the end into the Resonance Blaster, then set it on the floor.

"I guess it is." Kirsten said back to him, her voice laced with sarcastic wonder. Knock Out turned to her and propped himself against her platform. He was slightly smaller than Soundwave, her eyes met his eyes nearly head on. She wondered if he was able to sense Soundwave on her as Soundwave had done with him when he held her hand, or if it was just a Soundwave thing.

"You know," Knock Out started, "I COULD have put the forcefield generator in your leg without breaking it." He pondered while looking up and down her legs. Kirsten noticed his opportunity and she swung her legs off the desk and under it. "It probably would have worked better, but, oh well, you'll be fine with as much power as this thing will give out for a thing of your size."

Kirsten began to think that Knock Out had genuinely thought about it, rather than eluding to the fact that he was making up an excuse just to look at her legs.

She sighed hard, "I hope so..." she rolled her pen some more in her hand and then started doodling on the notepad.

"But here's the part I have to warn you about. This device takes a lot of energy." Knock Out hesitated on how to say what he needed to say to her, "So...if you don't keep calm, and keep your blood pressure low, you could run out of energy fast, and pass out before you reach the safe haven Soundwave has you retreating to."

Kirsten looked up into his eyes, questioning his words.

"Soundwave already went through the plan with me, he assumes that the forcefield, when activated, will last you about an hour until you run out of energy."

"What? Will I die if it runs too long?" Kirsten asked back to him rather abruptly.

"No no...you'll just pass out. Then I'll remotely shut it down when Soundwave arrives on the scene." Knock Out sighed, "He certainly has a way with planning."

Kirsten blinked her eyes heavily, "Tell me about it."

"Sometimes it'd be nice if he could just **tell** me his plans," Knock Out shook his head, "The details he goes into..."

It seemed to Kirsten that tension was rising on the ship, it must have been all the preparation. Knock Out seemed to concur with his eyes, the act of planning the attack was as taxing as the attack itself sometimes. They shared a brief moment of silence between themselves.

"So...**can** he talk?" Kirsten asked suddenly after the silence became too much for her, legitimately fueling her curiosity. She tapped her pen lightly against her notepad repeatedly, regetting asking the question.

"Psh, I don't know. Last time I think I heard him say anything was...well...was..." Knock Out rubbed his chin thoughtfully with his free hand and then held the hand out in front of him when he found himself at a loss for words, "I honestly can't remember the last time."

"Maybe Megatron ripped his vocal chords out when they fought." Kirsten found herself engrossed in the conversation with Knock Out about Soundwave's past. She set the can of soup on the desk and propped her feet up again, her favorite way to think.

"Maybe, hmm, a lot changed when he joined Megatron after he had been beaten in the ring. It was a big fight you know...I didn't know Soundwave personally back then but I had seen him fight, and, he was a **good** fighter."

"How do you mean that he changed?" Kirsten asked, setting her pen on the notepad and stretching her arms above her head for a break.

"Well for one, he used to be a lot bigger. He changed a lot of that when he became Megatron's lieutenant, to be faster and more receptive, rather than bulky and unnecessary. In the ring, one has to be strong. When fighting with the army of many Decepticons, his real gift was the ability to observe his enemy and retaliate. To him, bulk didn't succeed technological advances outside of the pits, so it was the route he chose. Granted, he's still strong but he's, as he likes to put it, 'more efficacious."

"So., he's a sleeker, faster form of himself?" Kirsten asked, wondering if she chose the right words.

"Sleek and fast, yes, menacing and creepy, also yes." Knock Out said with a smug look on his face.

"What is it about him that you think is so creepy?" Kirsten frowned at him. She didn't particularly like Soundwave's mysterious mannerisms either but she wouldn't go out of the way to call them 'creepy'.

"Well maybe that isn't the right word for it.." Knock Out pondered, "Maybe ominous and threatening is better? He **is** the best spy the likes of the universe has ever seen so...heh...just a warning to you," he leaned closer to her, "Watch what you say." His mouth curled up slightly from the right.

She looked into his sneaky eyes, he peered at her as if trying to pull something out from deep inside of her. She turned away from him, "I don't think I have to worry about that. The last thing I would ever want to do is piss **him** off." Her words were low, "I think I'm the last person who would ever want to lose his trust with the circumstances being what they are..." she turned to look into his red eyes again, sending a cold blue gaze back at him.

"You're putting a lot of faith in him aren't you." he said coldly, almost speaking out of jealousy as if he was offended.

"I suppose I am. But what other choice have I been given?"

"Well you didn't have to be here in the first place, but as **you** like to put it...here you are." Knock Out said back maliciously.

An anger she had never felt before rose in her stomach and tightened her neck, or so it felt. The feeling tingled her ears and she stood up to make her point, shoving a finger close to his cheek. "I wasn't invited, I was forced! And why shouldn't I trust Soundwave? Just because I'm not one of you doesn't mean that I don't have my own reason to fight with you, MECH is the one who brought me into this in the first place!" Her emotions took over her words, she spoke straight from the core of her heart itself, "I may not like what I'm doing, but I'm not about to jeopardize my own life in the middle of a conflict that's not even mine!"

Knock Out grinned at her, "Now you're acting like a Decepticon..." he chucked lowly, "All for one." His grin turned into a sly, disparaging look of satisfaction. Kirsten's hand began to tremble.

"Why are you such an asshole..." she said softly, her voice quivered slightly. She lowered her hand down to her side, feeling just the tinge of tears starting to form in her eyes.

Knock Out pushed himself up from leaning on the platform and paced himself across the room toward the door, "Because," he lowered his head gracefully, "it's the easiest way to block myself off from the contingencies of war. We all have coping mechanisms." Knock Out shot her a final glance and walked out of the room.

Wondering how she had become chosen to be the one in this situation, her body became hot with anger and frustration. She wasn't strong-willed and she had no interest in conflicts and wars. And yet, she sat in the chair that was to decide the fate of her own life. She looked back at the long months she had been on the battleship. It had already been so long. She was surprised at the time passed, and yet, it felt longer. Kirsten roughly plopped down into her chair again and slumped over her knees with her head in her hands. Wetness soaked her palms as she cried to herself.

She wished for comfort, she wished for security. She wished for her life to return to normal, knowing that it never would. 'So why not just keep driving. Nothing can change the past. Wishing doesn't do any good', Kirsten said to herself over and over again. 'Move on... and forget about it.' She raised her head back up from her knees and wiped off the tears still streaming down her face with the back of her hand. She picked up the notepad, wiped her flushed, pink nose on her sleeve and with a loud sniff, started to lay down more ink on the paper.

* * *

It was nearly 24 hours later that Soundwave actually showed himself in the gateway room again, but it was brief. Upon his entry, he didn't know where to expect Kirsten to be after his prolonged absence. He had his mind focused, however, to be prepared for even if he did make eye contact with her. He planned on ignoring her, for his own good. Simple.

To his surprise, though, and something he hadn't prepared himself for, was to find her asleep on the platform with her notebook covering her face, and, with her part of the message entirely decoded and translated on his own computer screen. He walked forward slowly, astounded at her proficiency. What did he know about indigenous leaves? Nothing. He couldn't have ever decoded that in the short amount of time that she did, though he would never admit it to anyone but himself and maybe Megatron. He mentally prepared himself for inner conflict, having her around was proving to be very advantageous to the Decepticon cause, but now, at a great cost to his own stability.

Quickly, he sent the message through the network before he made too much noise to awaken her and turned to leave the room. He looked back behind him, gripping the door's framework before he exited. Questionable, how an unyielding mech like himself faltered with such a petty excuse. He was disconcerted with his actions. And now it was all he could think about.

Lowering his gaze, he looked down on her living habitat. She didn't belong here. Yet, she fit so well into his design. This was all to be so temporary, and now he had recently been thinking about making her his permanent clerk. There was a way, if only Megatron approved the idea. He would never do that unless she could absolutely be trusted, but he wondered still if he could control himself. He thought back to Laserbeak's instatement, Megatron wasn't happy then either, but Soundwave never once had a bad plan, and he ended up keeping Laserbeak in the longer run.

Soundwave had some extra time to spend working on his own projects. He looked over to his recharging dock where the Resonance Blaster was and remembered that Knock Out had been in here. He tapped into the recording device in Kirsten's wrist and replayed their conversation silently through his mind.

Knock Out certainly sent Kirsten on emotional escapades when he wasn't there. Again, they had mentioned his gladiator days, and again, Knock Out seemed to forget that Kirsten was equipped with Soundwave's spying devices. He found it interesting and confusing that she was curious about his voice, about his past, that she was curious about him at all. He needed to start thinking about her future with the Decepticons, this space wasn't ideal for an indigenous earth habitat, but she didn't seem to ever complain about it. Perhaps she was too scared to, he thought. But perhaps it didn't matter to her either. So why did it even matter to him?

He repeated himself in his thoughts. But it did matter, it hadn't before but it did now. Things had changed, things always change.

Turning back to the room from his stance in the doorframe, he walked silently back over to the platform that Kirsten had fallen asleep on. He stared at her for several minutes, watching her lungs expand with every breath, and seeing her fingers curl and twitch with her dreams. It was a simple feeling, but he couldn't explain why he felt more empowered when he stood like that watching her without her knowing. He always had an interest in his silent observations, being invisible to those who were least suspecting. It seemed like a challenge now, at least. He was larger than her and thus, less easy to hide, and inherently more obvious to find.

He began to relate his theories to his plans of attack. There would be no reason to launch a secret attack against humans based on those principles alone. They didn't really fit the category of, inconspicuous. Soundwave had another epiphany, all attacks must ensue at once, and they must not convene prior to the exact moment. Yet another thing he had to figure out, based on his human observation. He had justified yet another reason to have her around, for self-awareness, developmental Cybertronian psychology, inner-species socialisms. The normal person was very different from the staff of MECH, there could be another way to tap from energon deposits...and he could utilize her to do it. He had to keep her around, it would be...efficient. Perhaps it was only a justification for deciding to keep her around.

Soundwave froze in position, still on his feet as Kirsten stirred. She must have felt Soundwave's warmth heating her body and she lazily rolled up her sleeves with her face still hidden behind the notebook. He made no sounds waiting for her to ease back down and doze off again. But much to his dismay, she didn't. She rolled over onto her left side and the notebook fell off her face, revealing half-lidded eyes.

Kirsten could see the outlines of him, but she wasn't completely coherent yet after her rousing. Her awareness wandered between real world and her dream world, where her dreams were about the ocean and the mountains. Her unconscious mind wanted her to keep dreaming, but her conscious mind was slowly taking over. But before she let it have total control, she twisted her waist to the right and stretched her arms to either side of her and basked in Soundwave's presence.

"Mmm, you're warm, like the sun." She said sleepily as she arched her back and smiled slightly. Her unconscious mind overrode her consciousness and she continued, "I like the sun." Her shoulders shifted forward and she stretched the upper part of her back, lifting the crevice of her arch again, and felt something smooth suddenly slide against her back. Her breath hitched. Soundwave's hand had found itself into the crevice between her back and the platform and he held her with his smooth fingers under her back. He crouched on the floor, lowering one knee on the ground in one slow, fluid motion.

Kirsten's consciousness quickly took over after she felt him reach out at her. He had slipped his left hand underneath her and his hovering thumb was casting shadows on her face, suspended in mid-air.

She felt his fingers shift underneath her and she reached for his bladed arm with her right hand for stability, holding onto the warm metal as his fingers shifted softly under her. His thumb came down finally and rested on her shoulder.

'_There's no way.._' Kirsten thought to herself while her entire body tingled. '_Was there?_' Just like last time, she couldn't move, more stunned at the unfitting character that Soundwave portrayed than anything.

Soundwave was just as surprised as she was to find his hand underneath her, holding her back so suddenly. But she had invited him in, hadn't she? Just the small stretch she performed and him seeing her arched torso was so incredibly indicative of Cybertronian courtship rituals that the senses in his body that were starting to awaken last time, were now fully awake. She had provided the tinder for his interest to burn for her and now, he knew it would be nearly impossible to snuff it out. Eons of evolution and millenia of developmental change could not stifle that one physical and psychological need that he had known to be dormant within most of his race, save Knock Out perhaps.

Why did it have to be him, he wondered. He had interacted with Arcee and Airachnid both without a problem or a misstep, so what was it about her that made him so vulnerable? She was smart and cunning. She was also healthy and had a good form, an attractive characteristic for spawning a future generation of beings, but so were the other femmes.

But, she respected him. She made him feel like the powerful male that he was, that he strived to be. She was small and he felt power over her, another primitive feeling that made him feel accomplished. It was a power such that it made him feel stronger within himself.

His reaction to those thoughts led him to continue his exploration, by choosing not to conflict with himself, and choosing to take control, so he did what he had to do. With one quick movement of his other hand, he reached to the keyboard, shutting and locking the door behind them and blocking all communications links. By assuming dominance to control these psychological feelings would ensure him the stability that he was starting to lack.

Kirsten's pulse raced, her grip on Soundwave's bladed arm tightened. She was lying on the platform with no guard and no plan. She didn't even have the strength to sit up but she tried. She tried to activate her legs under her and they complied, kind of. Freed from his touch, she tried to stumble to her feet, unsuccessfully. She tumbled backwards onto her butt and then backed away from him, bumping her back against the wall of the protruding keyboard, noting that her boundaries were short. Her hair fell in front of her eyes and she scooped the strays out of her face almost immediately only to notice his hand was gone.

Her eyes met his gaze head on, and she instinctively lowered her head and frowned to him. He was amused at her anger, she wasn't scared, nor was she repulsed, but angry. That was a good sign. It challenged him. Rather than playing the cat and mouse strategy he had originally intended, he switched to a more narcissistic plan. He straightened his back, unfolding from his crouched position but stayed kneeling. He pushed his chest out and opened up his arms, looking like a bird about to take flight.

He flicked his head upward.

Kirsten remembered the stance, the slight flick of the head, the challenge, when he invited her to approach him that one day. She was angry because she couldn't do anything about his power over her. She was just too small. But this new action he took, it was almost like he was asking for her reciprocation. He was confronting her, testing her. She felt it. Her anger was slowly shifting to mischief as she trembled to her feet. Who was there to judge her other than herself if she decided to return the random act of passion. She was curious to find out what exactly Soundwave wanted from her, trusting that he wouldn't hurt her in any way. At least she had that leverage, he needed her for his future implementations.

She took a few steps forward to him. She didn't falter her gaze into his visor, but as she came closer to him, his head lowered in silence, contending his position. She stopped just an arm length away from him, opposing his stance with her own. They examined each other for a while before reacting.

He knew he liked her for some reason. He moved an arm to her, raising his hand, his fingers in front of her facing upward. She stepped toward them, running her own hand up one of his slender fingers, hoping that she would make him feel the same sensations that she had experienced that had caused this mess in the first place. His hand twitched at her touch and then closed in on her hand, grasping her entire arm. It was awkward. He held her arm like a pen but he slowly slip his grasp down the length of it and then let her hand curl over his last finger before taking it away.

A few blips from the computer screen caught their attention as soon as the energy in the room had gotten heavier. Kirsten's face was flushed red and Soundwave's heat was nearly unbearable to her. She had started to sweat earlier on which made her skin glow an indigo hue with Soundwave's armor lighting up the air around her. Soundwave stepped aside and shook off his confused mind and body and retreated to work mode again. He couldn't let himself be sidetracked so easily at this time. He opened the transmission.

"Soundwave, where have you been, I've tried to connect with you three times!" Knock Out complained to him through the screen, "The device is ready, make sure the patient comes to me without food in her stomach, we don't need a relapse of last time..." Soundwave nodded at him and cut off the screen. He turned to her.

Kirsten's blood began to race again, it was time for her to become even more robotic than ever. Looking up to Soundwave in the middle of the stairs, she stopped her gait and hesitated. Her face began to blush, knowing that she could never look at him the same again. Some kind of unsaid energy passed through them just now and she couldn't make sense of what her mind was telling her to feel.

Soundwave liked the red color that overrode her fleshy tanned face. He didn't know why, but he did. He looked up again and then exited the room promptly. Kirsten drug herself back to the walled confines of her room and stripped down to her bare body. She began pouring gallons of water into the small metal crucible, cleaning off before Knock Out got ahold of her.


	17. Feelings, Functions, and Futures

_Thank you! I've started to write longer chapters just because I have a lot to say I guess, multiple things happening. Concerns? questions? I'm open. Love your faces! ;) ~K_

Ch 17: Feelings, functions, and futures.

"Hey!..." There was a snapping sound...

Kirsten's eyes fluttered slightly...

"Come on, peachy!" ….

…...

…..Kirsten's eyes fluttered again, this time trying to stay open longer. Her vision was blurry, _where was she? Was she home? Was she dreaming..?_

"For fuck's sake, peachy, snap out of it! I see you trying to wake up!" Knock Out snapped his fingers in front of her eyes. Kirsten rolled her head around drearily. She was cold.

"Nngh..." she mumbled through her teeth, not being able to move any limbs or muscles yet. Her eyes squeezed shut and then she tried to open them again using the squint as leverage. They popped open only to close lazily again. She felt like she had been asleep for years. What had happened? That voice sounded vaguely familiar but, it was a voice that was only in her dreams.

Knock Out shook his head above her, thinking he had probably used too much anesthesia, which hadn't kill her, luckily. He shrugged it off nervously, Soundwave wouldn't like his plans to change so suddenly being so close to the attack. He was relieved though, she should have woken up hours ago from the surgery, at least she pulled through. Knock Out walked towards his monitor and opened a comm-link to Soundwave.

"Soundwave, she's done and kind of awake." Knock Out waited for Soundwave's response with a slight hesitation, knowing that Soundwave was busy forming plans with Megatron. His eyes flickered across the screen, waiting.

Within moments, Soundwave sent back a diagram of Kirsten's body, directly pointing to the nerves and arteries that had been worked on, and what Knock Out needed to test for before letting her go.

"Well she's functioning..." Knock Out said as he scrolled through the diagnostics of the device, "and it's functioning. It's um, it's just that she's still kind of under, but she should come out of it in an hour or two. Then testing can commence."

"S-sound...w-a-ave..." Kirsten murmured through tight lips, "thefumm I haveto.. The typing...what'ssat..." what she was trying to say was supposed to make a complete sentence, but the attempt was pathetic at best. She couldn't move her mouth, most of her body and her eyes didn't stay open for more than a second. She felt like she had been working out at a gym all night, drinking vodka instead of gatorade, and then beaten by a few tree limbs. She crunched her face to activate her muscles._  
_

As Kirsten's mind finally came to, Knock Out had ended the transmission and sauntered back to Kirsten on the large metal table. He tapped on it, sending painful vibrations through her sensitive body.

"Ahhh!Stopstp-stp...st-t-tp!.." was what she managed to get out before her muscles failed her again. But with the vibration of the table activating her defense mechanism, her arms flailed up to her head to hold her brain in place before it reverberated out of her skull. And that's when the searing pain hit her. Her mind became aware, her eyes shot open, and her jaw nearly unhinged from itself. She screamed at the top of her lungs, her chest fully expanded to hold all of the air, and she kept screaming.

"Ahh fuck!" Knock Out reached up to hold his hands against his audio receptors and he winced at the severe high-pitched tone of her pained voice.

Kirsten's chest panted with each heavy breath and a loud piercing scream accompanied each exhale. Her body contorted and rolled to the right, onto her right arm where the device had been implanted, perhaps a bit more roughly than she could have handled, Knock Out began to think. She held her right arm with the other and she rolled against the cold metal table, trying to massage out the horrible pain that burned through her entire arm. Tears streamed down her face and her cheeks were an incredible bright color of red. She scooted against the table, curling her toes against her shoes and pushing against her ground, forcing her arm between the table and herself, wishing it could just be snuffed out.

"Grrargh!" Knock Out forced his hands down to his sides, enduring the piercing screams escaping Kirsten's mouth still, knowing that they wouldn't die down until she calmed down. He looked around his room hastily, wondering what he could use to shut her up or calm her down. He couldn't gas her anymore, he'd probably kill her. He had no organic chemical substance for decreasing nerve spasms, nor did he have a way to just bottle her up until she stopped screaming.

"Damn!" he cursed, and leaned over her, turning her so that she was forced onto her back and he pinned her arms out to the sides.

"Listen, I know it hurts!" he growled to her, "But you've got to keep calm!" Knock Out roared into her glistening face. Kirsten's eyes were open now, more than ever, but they were quickly slammed shut by the mounting pain in her body.

"Just bear with me for a while, take some of those breaths that you do..." Knock Out started to talk to her more calmly but still gruffly, "Your blood stream has been diverted and your body is just trying to get use to it!" He could feel her body twitching beneath his hands, he had a grip on both of her arms, pinning her in one place but her movements were so jagged that he thought that she may eventually hurt herself.

"It hurts!" She screamed at him, starting to sob uncontrollably, "AAARgh!" She wriggled beneath him, wanting to hold her arm, to itch it, to rip it off, to tear her body to shreds if it would give her one bit of relief from the unbearable pain traveling through her. "Motherfucker!" she managed to yell with one huge breath through her clenched teeth.

Knock Out was taken aback by her sudden uncharacteristic curse, and he smirked, "Well there we go, moving right along from delirium, to pain, to anger, then what? Hopefully quiet?" He snorted the last part to her.

Kirsten clenched her teeth so hard that she thought she'd crush them right out of her mouth, but she tried her hardest to muffle her screams of agony, not for Knock Out's good, but for her own developing migraine. She breathed heavy, letting a squeak or yelp escape here and there, but she found that the more she held her breath, the more it kind of helped mask the pain. And Knock Out noticed the more she was holding her breath, the less she screamed, and the faster she began to pass out.

"There you go..." he said softly but with an edge of creep, looking downcast upon her with his burning red eyes.

Kirsten flexed and her muscles spasmed both voluntarily and involuntarily as her body tried to cope with the pain and her mind started to deal with the feeling of being in horrific agony. Her body was responding to the shock which was the initial awakening to the new titanium part of her body inside her. Her eyes rolled to the side and her head became fuzzy again, she started to think about what side her face was about to drop to when she was going to faint, she felt it approaching and within seconds, her body became limp and her head dropped to the right, towards the door and out to the corridor...

* * *

"What- is that?" Megatron turned his head swiftly towards the corridor heading to Knock Out's operation room. Energon-curdling screams were being emitted from the medic's area. None of the drones, nor Dreadwing could hear the high-pitched sound. Only Megatron and Soundwave picked up on it. He raised a brow plate and turned to face Soundwave.

"So- that is our trump, Soundwave?" He lifted his chin so that he seemed more regal above his grey and indigo commander. His eyes squeezed shut briefly at another piercing scream echoing in his audio receptors.

Soundwave wasn't nervous, he knew it would be a challenging bit of equipment to install, and he knew that it would hurt, but he hadn't counted on her screams disrupting his meeting with Megatron. Only moments before, he had communicated to Knock Out the tests that were to commence but in that short time, things had taken a drastic turn.

"Do you need to tend to your protege, Soundwave?" Megatron sneered, obviously not happy with the interruption.

Soundwave ignored his snide comment and continued his display of a recent visit to the east MECH base, configuring and analyzing entrance routes and base schematics. Megatron lowered his head to Soundwave's illustrative faceplate, acknowledging that Soundwave knew that Megatron always, and always would come first. The screams eventually died down and stopped completely, but the interruption had already happened and it continued to be on his mind until the meeting ended.

Soundwave gladly was thinking more clearly since his and Kirsten's last encounter. He was feeling a lot better about his impulsive action for the greater cause. By understanding a little more about himself, he was able to focus on the plan he had in store, not constantly fighting the feelings, but accepting them as totally normal. He took long strides back to the medic's bay and stopped when he reached the entrance.

Kirsten looked passed out on the table, any mess that had been made had been cleaned up, and her arm was fully seamed up. He took a quick scan of her vitals. Low bpm, high level of red blood cells. Obviously her body had undergone some shock when she had awoken. He scanned her content. 7% titanium and 0.2% zinc. The implant had worked.

Her face was turned to the doorway, he watched as her chest rose and fell softly with each breath she took. Their bodies functioned so differently, yet, so similarly that he couldn't decide which of them was more alive. He imagined the sound of her screams and wondered what she must have been feeling. A cold shiver shook it's way down Soundwave's metal spine, knowing a great pain had been inflicted on her. But again, he couldn't figure out if he didn't care, or if he actually did. He had witnessed Laserbeak getting hurt many times before, but he didn't worry about her because he knew she could be fixed to an extent. The pure mystery of the human body's ability to fix itself made him skeptical.

He had a very strange idea suddenly. What if her primitive biology wasn't so primitive afterall.

Soundwave took steps into the room finally, alerting Knock Out to his presence. Knock Out turned form his monitor and scowled at him. He blatantly put a hand on his hip and leaned the other hand on the table. He stared at him for several seconds before he opened his big mouth.

"Well...?" he said with an obvious intended purpose.

Soundwave displayed a diagram of her anesthesia versus mass ratio to him through his visor, then topped it off with a chemical substance of C18H21NO3. _(Codeine)_

"Fine!" Knock Out threw his hands in the air, "I'll admit I wasn't prepared for her to come out of it and fucking scream through the whole ship. What was that formula again?" Knock Out sighed with a calmer voice, "I'll see if I can make some from stuff I've got laying around...not promising anything though." He was obviously annoyed, but not about just the screams, but also about the inability to foresee the reaction that he didn't prepare himself for. Usually, he was a really good doctor and learning about this new species was frustrating him. Although enlightening, it would have been nice to practice on an individual who didn't hold so much bearing on the ship.

Soundwave inquired about her cognitive functions when she was awake through a diagram.

"Well, there were the screams," Knock Out started sarcastically and counted one on his fingers, "And then she cursed me...and then she passed out." Knock Out held up three digits then he started to chuckle maniacally, "I don't know which was more disturbing, her screams or the fact that your name was the first thing to come out of her mouth when she started to come to considering **I** was the one here working on her!" He placed a snobby hand against his chest and cocked his head to the side as he scowled tauntingly to Soundwave, who had turned his head towards the table.

"Hey, I've got a brilliant idea, how about we test the forcefield while she's sleeping so that we don't scare the shit out of her? Unless you think you can handle some more screaming..." Knock Out said bluntly to Soundwave, turning his own head to look at the human on the table.

"That's a wonderful idea..." a third presence chided in. Megatron had made his way to the medic's room and Knock Out and Soundwave both watched him step closer to the table, surprised, and a little anxious. They awaited his next words.

"So- this..." Megatron looked down on the small creature in the middle of the table, tired and asleep, "..this is disturbing to me, just so you both know."

Knock Out and Soundwave both were caught off-guard with his disputing comment after being surprised at his appearance in the room. Knock Out stuttered in his throat, not knowing whether to agree with him or not. Soundwave, as always, didn't say anything, and didn't plan on it.

"As we sever our ties with one human alliance, we gain another, something I am not looking forward to." Megatron placed his words heavily on the table, awaiting comment from one of his soldiers. "If there is any reason not to trust her loyalty, I suggest either of you speak now before I let you continue with this questionable experiment.

"My Leige," Knock Out started, glancing quickly at Soundwave, "I'm sure the pain we've induced will not be indicative of any change in loyalty from the little human." Knock Out defended Soundwave's position, knowing that he would probably speak for the both of them.

"Soundwave?" Megatron shifted his eyes onto his visor with his piercing gaze, "Do you support that theory?"

Soundwave acknowledged Knock Out's words with a simple nod. Megatron let out a throaty growl and then shifted his eyes to Kirsten.

"What was once an alliance with MECH, now has turned out to be our advantage to their betrayal, but torturing that advantage might make her question herself. With every flick of the whip, an ounce of allegiance can decrease. I want both of you to make sure that this doesn't happen, do you both understand? I cannot afford to lose my mind wondering what is best for the Decepticons on this fucking planet, that is why I entrust you with these tasks. Don't make me regret that decision." His eyes became slivers as he shifted his eyes to look down on his officer and medic, "And Soundwave," he grumbled, "One shifting allegiance is expected, two is disgraceful."

Soundwave nodded with confidence to his leader, he knew that she wouldn't disappoint him, or Megatron...he hoped.

Megatron turned silently on his heel and walked ominously out of the room. Once he was out of sight, both Knock Out and Soundwave slumped almost in relief, relaxing their shoulders and un-tensing their strained energon wires, and they glanced to each other wittingly, knowing that their experiment should be watched over at all costs.

* * *

Kirsten started awaking the second time, and this time she was a little less drowsy from the chemicals used to sedate her. She squinted into a light source, her arm still hurt like all hell but it wasn't as excruciating as she remembered it being. She didn't know where she was, or how long she'd been asleep since she had awoke with that intense burning pain shooting through her arm. Her eyes began to focus, and she made out the light source to be the light being emitted from the corridor behind the frame of the massive door. She was still on the metal table where she had passed out. It looked like no one was in the room though. All of the lights were dim and sounds were non-existent.

She slowly sat up from the table's hard surface and immediately clenched her arm with her hand. It still hurt like bloody hell but she felt groggy, maybe they had given her some painkillers. She looked at her arm, it was clean and precise save the small seam that ran along the inside of the entire length. She flinched at turning her arm, the pain mounting as she moved it. She panted, feeling the pain arise again in her arm and spreading through her body quickly. She crumpled over with small whimpers onto the cold, metal surface, touching the top of her head to the table. Tears began leaking again and flowed upwards towards her hairline as she held her arm in painful silence. "Oww..." she whispered to herself. She didn't cry because she was sad, she cried because her body told her so, she had no control of it.

After a handful of minutes passed with silent tears, Kirsten raised her head up and looked out the door, waiting for someone to walk in, if they would. After another lengthy duration, she decided it would be best to return on her own. If they wanted her to stay there, they would have shut and locked the door, of course. So they had let her awaken on her own, cute. So they had also left her to try to figure out how to jump down from the high table with a pained arm. It wasn't that far down, it was probably only 9 feet. But the impact would surge through her arm, she predicted, and that wouldn't feel good. She wobbled to her feet and made her way to the edge of the table and looked down, and then gasped.

They had planned! She was entirely too happy to see a single solid empty energon cube at the edge of the table. It was still a jump, but a lesser one. She sat on the edge of the table and could tap the edge of the cube with her foot and slowly jumped onto it, and then did the same to the floor. The landing onto the floor was slightly more jarring than she wanted it to be but she had made it. Holding her arm, she walked out of the room and into the long corridors towards Soundwave's office, her room. But before she had a chance to turn even the first corner, a large, metal foot suddenly blocked her path and the vibrations sent her dancing on her feet for balance. She froze in position and followed the large grey foot up to it's connected face and she choked, it was Megatron.

Megatron looked down at her, she was only as tall as the top of his ankle joint, and to her, he looked like the biggest, most menacing thing she'd ever seen from the ground. All other times, she had addressed him on a platform of sorts, but now, she really got a sense of how big he really was. She immediately bowed to him, knowing full well that her loyalty was **always** at stake. "Lord Megatron." She said loudly for him to hear. Her head bowed close to the edge of his foot. Expecting him to simply grunt and walk over her, she caught sight of his hand lowering and it rested on the ground palm up. She stood up at once, noticing his kneeled posture and inquisitive gaze. Immediately, she knew she should comply. She stepped forward onto his massive hand and kneeled, not wanting to fall from instability. His hand came up and around and cupped what he could of her, which was mostly her folded legs and butt. She fit quite well in the palm of his hand, and he lifted her to just below his eye level.

"You address me as such, but do you really believe what you say?" Megatron spoke softly with his gruff voice to her as he kept walking the way he was headed. Kirsten noticed that he wasn't going to return her to the room right now, so she relaxed a little more into his grip.

"I believe that you have power over me, but never in my life have I called anyone 'Lord'," she hesitated continuing, but something about the drugs she had been given made her feel a little numb to her feelings and her thoughts, or so she tried to blame her honesty on it anyway, "It comes unnaturally and incomprehensible for me to understand it's meaning fully." Kirsten said honestly, hoping that the truth would be more appeasing to him than faking a greater loyalty than she actually possessed.

"So the answer would be 'no'..." Megatron grunted to her, his voice a stiff chasm being emitted from deep within his throat, "You know that's very dangerous..." He looked down on the top of her head, his eyes glowing with power and strong energy, Kirsten could barely keep her gaze straight from the lights in the corridor, making her eyes seem more sensitive than ever.

"I know." She said back and tugged at her neck, her hair falling over her shoulders and falling across some of his cupped fingers.

Megatron stared at her, silently, but walking slowly and distinctively. He reached another room and punched in some codes to open the door.

"Rest assured that I approve of you only because Soundwave approves, and my respect for Soundwave retreats eons back into history, before the Decepticons, and before this war. Never has he faltered and never has he wavered." Megatron spoke of Soundwave in a booming voice, as if the tonality was a direct representation of his respect to him. "And never have I seen him so enamored with another species as yours."

Kirsten's heart jumped at the sound of his words and she clenched her arm at the joint of her elbow tighter, wondering what he knew, what he imagined happened behind their closed doors.

"We know that humans can use our technology, but he also believes that we can use your biology for our advantage." Megatron took her to a corner of the dark room that he entered and flicked a switch.

The room lit up dimly, and an eerie feeling came over Kirsten. She scanned the room with her eyes and they fell upon a smooth, sleek shell of a form, still, unmoving, unliving. She gasped and jumped anxiously at the sight. It was like a blank form, a prototype of a Cybertronian body ready to be formed.

"Your experimentation is leading us to our own development oddly enough." Megatron sighed hard, "Soundwave insists that your species has advancements to offer but I am skeptical as you can tell." Megatron held his head higher and looked to the far corner of the room, where a small monitor displayed vitals of the form. "This body holds nothing other than the fact that it is a functioning body, and that's all that it is. It is another experiment of a new type of living metal. There is no brain, no spark, and no soul." He turned his head slowly towards her and she met his gaze with equal inquiry. "It waits for such..."

Kirsten felt like his eyes were burning into her heart, creating a massive hole in her stomach and curdling all of her blood, just with his gaze alone. She felt her breaths coming in small short gasps, wondering if she understood him correctly, because if she did...

"I appreciate your honesty in declaring your lack of honor to me, If you had answered otherwise, I would not have believed you anyway, because in order to pledge your allegience to me and the Decepticons fully, you must be one of us." His slow, fierce voice boomed in her ears, her brain catching every single wavelength of his powerful words, "and...it waits for you, if you so choose. You would be the fourth."

Kirsten's eyes flickered back to the lifeless but life-filled body. This could be hers... if she so chose. The grip on her arm lessened and she stared silently at the form. A blank prototype of a body laid out in front of her, as if she were looking at the future that she could choose to have. But...the fourth?

Megatron reached over and shut the dim light off and exited the room with Kirsten still silently staring in his hand. He didn't speak to her again until he had taken her back to her room. He slowly set her on the ground and he stepped back. She stepped off his hand and reluctantly looked around and up to him towering above her.

"I want you to always remember this. Nothing happens on this ship without my knowledge." Megatron glared at her and he snarled, turning away from her and heading towards the bridge.

Kirsten could about have fainted when he said that to her, and she kind of did. Her knees became so shaky that she had to kneel. Placing her hands on the floor too, she had forgotten suddenly how much her arm still hurt her. She sunk all the way down to the ground, touching the floor with her head. It was nice and cold, and it felt good because it seemed as though she was burning up from the inside. She stayed there for a long, long time. _  
_

* * *

_Later..._

Soundwave entered the room a few hours after Kirsten had laid her head down, too weak for many reasons to remove herself from the floor in due time. He jumped as he almost kicked her when he entered and dodged to the side to avoid her. The clamor woke her up and she opened her eyes.

"Soundwave..." she said lazily. Then she sat up, "Soundwave!" realizing that he was there, finally. Soundwave cocked his head at her and leaned closer, kneeling to her.

"Omygod..." she clasped her hands over her mouth and looked his way, scooting closer to him on her knees. She tried to speak but the words didn't come to her easily. She yelped with the movements of her arm and then grimaced her face in pain, "Megatron..." she managed to say, a shooting pain distracting her slightly. She looked up into his visor. He gave her a slow, very meticulous nod. She grunted, she was so embarrassed.

"Why..?" she whispered. "A body? My life?"

All he did was dip his head low. She started turning colors again, that brilliant shade of red that he'd come to like, that brilliant shade of red that meant so many things, her anger, her shyness, her pain and her happiness. All the things that he wasn't able to portray. She did it for him. He reached his arm out to her and pointed at her head and then withdrew it, waiting for an answer.

Kirsten stared at him, what was he trying to get at, she wondered. Not taking the hint, he repeated the action again and then waited.

"Soundwave, I-I don't understand." she shook her head in frustration, "My head?"

Soundwave raised his arm again and slowly put his fingers to his visor, touching it gently to where his optics were behind the mask, and then lowering the fingers to her, resting two fingers gently on the top of her head. She watched his fingers rest again on the ground in front of her, waiting for her response. She could only think of one thing.

"He...sees, my potential as a Decepticon?" she asked quietly. Soundwave nodded at her immediately, knowing she'd figure it out. She lowered her head, "No. He wants to use me as an experiment." Again, Soundwave nodded his head when she half expected him to stay silent or refute her words. _'Great..both'_ she thought. Why did he degrade her so, when they had developed enough of an amiable relationship that this kind of treatment wasn't expected anymore.

Soundwave held a finger up in front of her, motioning for her to pay attention, he always did that. He stood up quickly, as if he had received some kind of transmission, he typed on the screen in the room and tapped lightly on the platform. Kirsten got up, switching modes suddenly to business and climbed the stairs.

Megatron showed on the screen and Soundwave and Kirsten both stood to see his face.

"Kirsten, you have a meeting with the professor tomorrow and I have a script for you." Megatron said, eying her thoughtfully. Kirsten gulped and glanced sideways at Soundwave. "He thinks you've been decoding the automatic defense shaped laser schematics and the long range ion cannon, so you will tell him such. Your scheduled visit to Mech is 24 hours from your meeting."

"Yes sir." She answered back strongly.

"The attack from MECH as you decoded, is planned a week from today, do not allow him to see it in your face. This is what we've prepared you for. If you screw this up, we'll kill you. If you don't, you know your reward." Megatron ended the transmission abruptly and that was it.

* * *

The next day came too fast, Kirsten had wallowed in her pain until the end of the previous day, but to her surprise, her arm felt much better on this day. The day she was to meet with the professor before her visit. Had the time already passed so quickly? She hadn't seen Soundwave all morning, she wondered what time the meeting would be at. She looked around for the time, nothing showed it. She supposed maybe next time she got abducted she would wear a watch.

She was sitting with her feet up on the desk, tearing bits of paper into small origami. She only knew how to fold two things, a box and a paper airplane. Not much of an origami talent. As she started to fold her third box, she wondered if she would be sent home after the attack. Certainly her life wouldn't be back to normal, the government knew of her identity on the ship, but they didn't know that she was working for the enemy. She would come through the ground bridge with fake magnetic explosives, her arm was to also be magnetic so that they couldn't just take her out of the base, and then the rest would hopefully go to plan. She dropped her hands in her lap, squishing the box she was making. She started to get angry. Mech, what a horrible organization, everyone wanted power. Power and status.

She threw the box over the platform and it made a tapping noise once it reached the floor. Amazingly enough though, she had been offered power and status without asking. She didn't want to become one of them, but the idea mulled around in her brain every now and then since Megatron showed her the shell of a body. She probably knew more about them than anyone else on Earth, even through her studies, that doesn't portray personalities, lifestyles or their history. Still, she tried to figure out the nicest way to say no. _'Wow...'_ she thought. She'd always been the beach bum who just wanted to surf all day, until that one day that made her choose her college major.

She was only 15 at the time. She found some trash balled up on the beach as she was getting ready to go out, and it caught her eye. It was some beer labels and other labels from Thailand that must have rode the waves of the Pacific over to the west coast. The foreign symbols got her attention and she started to re-write them and search the language on the internet. Now that she was 22 and almost done with her college studies, how things had changed from that day.

Her mind was brought back into reality as she heard the door to the room open, and in walked Soundwave. Her heart jumped at the sight of him. She had grown quite fond of him over the past two months. She wondered if she went back to her home, if she'd ever see him again. Especially with the things they had experienced. She blushed at the thought and wondered if he might have a chance of sharing her sentiments.

Soundwave looked at her and portrayed that her meeting with the professor was to start in 20 minutes. Kirsten nodded back at him and looked longingly into his visor, looking at her reflection.

Soundwave marveled at her weird appearance, she was a lot more calm than usual, even though her normal demeanor was pretty calm, but she looked...inquisitive, or anxious, maybe both. He questioned her thoughts by showing her a scan of her brain. Low activity, slow processing.

"Just, thinking..." she shifted her eyes to the side. He responded by tapping his computer monitor and typing up a script for her.

"No no... not about that. I've got that down.." she responded and swung her legs off of the desk. "About my future after the MECH attack." she said quietly. "Will I go home?" she asked him genuinely.

Soundwave stared at her for a while in silence, what did she mean...'will I go home?'..of course not, they had a body waiting for her in one of the bays, she proved herself useful and Soundwave wanted to make sure that she stayed around to keep working. It was the only way Megatron would allow it as he had told him. He lighted up his visor with the prototype's form, depicting the process of body and mind shifting, how they would make her, a giant Cybertronian. She would be the fourth experiment, and hopefully the most successful.

Kirsten stared at his face, she didn't want to, but she didn't want to tell him right now, not before the attack. All she did was nod back to him, displaying the very personality back to him that she'd come to respect.

A few more minutes passed and a blip of the screen signaled that the meeting was ready to commence. The video started and she was staring into the eyes of her fate.

"Kirsten! It has been a long time hasn't it!" the professor's face lit up in green on the screen.

"Yes!" she managed a fake smile, "It certainly has! Long enough for me to finish two transcriptions for you."

"Very nice, how do they look!?" he looked at her with an unnerving smile.

"Um...complex?" she shrugged. "I don't understand any of that." She had to try to remember the last thing she had actually transcribed, it was pretty complex but she had no idea how the things worked, even though she had read the whole document.

"Of course.." the professor nodded, "Soundwave! How are you." he said with a stupid smile through the screen as Soundwave leaned ominously behind Kirsten. He didn't move, not acknowledging the professor at all.

"Okay well, yes..." the professor clasped his hands. "Kirsten, is there anything you'd need upon your return?"

Kirsten shrugged, "Water, food, shelter, light... the norm I guess. Where's Ann?"

"Oh she's back in school, why? Do you need to speak with her?" he looked at her as she tried to find a reason as to why she asked that sudden question. She hesitated. She had hoped that Ann wouldn't get caught in the crossfire, she was still so young and innocent to the organization but she managed to think up a quick excuse while the professor eyed her inquisitively.

"Well..." she choked out.

"Why do you need Ann, Kirsten?" he asked seriously. She thought fast.

"I'm out of tampons." she said in a hasty voice.

"Oh! Oh, say no more, okay.. um...I think I can send Julia out on that duty before you arrive.." the professor said in a semi-grossed out voice. Kirsten's ass was saved.

"Okay...girl things..." he was jotting down the quick note, "...so we'll see you tomorrow at 10 am and we'll have supplies ready for you to take back of course."

"So... no break I take it? Standard procedure?" She tilted her head sideways.

"You can have the day here, the cafe is making panini's tomorrow! And the sun's supposed to be shining bright, you can work on that fading tan."

"Yum, can't wait!" Kirsten said back. "See you tomorrow at 10 then..." the transmission was ended by the professor and Kirsten's blood boiled. She took one of the boxes she'd dumped on the platform and threw it at the empty computer screen. It bounced off of the clear glassy surface and fell back to the floor lightly.

Kirsten huffed and lowered her head to look at the floor. She'd be glad when this was to all be over, but nothing compared to the misery she felt if she never saw her family again if it all went horribly wrong. She was angry and sad and kept those emotions in check while she also mentally prepared herself for tomorrow. Her body couldn't process it all at once, so she closed her eyes and her mind went fuzzy while she stood very still, looking towards the floor.

She felt a warm, hard digit underneath her chin suddenly, lifting her head slightly. She opened her eyes and saw Soundwave's finger being the object. Soundwave lifted her head with his finger slowly, and cautiously. She dropped her arms down by her sides and the strands of hair in her face fell sideways as her head got higher. She didn't know how to feel, there were too many things to feel, but she focused into Soundwave's visor. He dipped his head intently and his finger crept away from her chin, slowly, delicately rubbing against the sensitive area under her jaw before retreating it completely.

Kirsten took note of the lingered touch and it sent shivers down her spine all the way to her toes. It was a gentle touch, a touch that left her longing for more, but couldn't pursue it. He didn't linger long, he turned suddenly and headed out of the door, his long strides the last thing she saw before the door was closed, leaving her alone with her thoughts again, coupled with a strange new feeling that he had pulled from within her just now...

_'Tomorrow...will be interesting.'_ she thought.


	18. The Day

**a/n: I am SOOOO sorry for the really late and much anticipated next chapter! Now that the holidays are over, I can write again. This chapter is very plot oriented and what the entire build up has been for. Please enjoy!:) I have much more to go after this. Just a warning- I don't care if scars are angsty and overdone, I like them anyway:P I haven't read enough Soundwave fanfics to know what is the popular choice for his face. So I just make it up as I see it. **

**Important a/n****: if you want to see my artsy depiction of Soundwave with a broken visor as depicted in this story please visit my Deviantart page ~Kaisunami is my name. It is entitled "Soundwave Wounded"**

Ch18 The Deed

Her heart raced. Her mind was flooded. Her fingers tingled. Her body was jerked back and forth, the faux explosives became tighter against her body. Once again, she wondered how she had gotten herself into such a situation, a situation that had progressively became more and more demanding.

"There." Knock Out said with a final tug. "They won't even begin to think of how to get these off of you." He mumbled, checking another tie down with his finger, tugging at its strength.

"Not that they would try anyway..." Kirsten said with annoyance in the tone of her voice.

They were preparing for her departure to the Mech base, the final episode in this crazy escapade of hers. Soundwave and Knock Out were overseeing her explosives, the faux bombs, that were to be strapped to her body. They were big, three rocket looking containers strapped along her torso, two in back and one in front, about the size of a yard stick and the girth of a milk jug. They were not entirely heavy, but had good weight to them.

"Probably not, but it sure is intimidating." Knock Out chuckled. "Remember I am going to activate this electromagnet so that they have no choice but to get out, so don't be so quick to jump to conclusions when it pulls you to the wall."

"How do you know their walls are metal?" Kirsten asked with uncertainty. Knock Out flicked his head sideways towards Soundwave, indicating.

"Ready?" Knock Out said with a devious tone.

"No." Kirsten said and reluctantly turned to the area where the ground bridge was supposed to open on the bridgehead, "but...here I am."

Megaton stood behind them and watched the statistics of the Mech bases that Soundwave had brought up for him. They were moving along normally, knowing nothing. Kirsten didn't want to see the screens, she didn't want to know how many people...

"This is perfect. It's almost time..." Megaton said. The MECH base hadn't led on to knowing a thing about their operations. They had gathered enough energon necessary to function for a long time without the need to harvest it until another agreement was made in the future. Not that they ever needed permission, but it was a hell of a lot easier to harvest energon without the sneaky humans prodding at them constantly.

A communication came through. Megatron nodded to a drone operating the ground bridge and it opened. Like always, MECH opened it first so that their base coordinates were hidden. It didn't matter, Soundwave had successfully located all three bases that were to be attacked and troops were waiting, silently, stealthily, unmercifully.

Kirsten felt like she was about to throw up, the burning in her belly was so strong that every step she managed forward felt like a jarring gut punch. All of the Decepticons watched her slowly make her way to the green light. Before she entered, she glanced shortly up at Soundwave, who intently watched her too. She wondered if he would come to her rescue like a fairytale prince after the deed was done and she also wondered if it was just a front. Either way, there was no choice now. Much to her surprise and comfort, he gave her a slight nod just before she entered the bridge. Her breath held tight, her footstep slipped into the light, and she was gone. The bait had been hooked and sunk.

* * *

The Mech base had prepared for her visit as normal, the guards and the metal detector waited for her at the entrance and the professor tapped his foot impatiently. He was more antsy than normal today, for this was the last delivery that was to be made before the planned attack on the Decepticons due to happen in just a few days. The professor looked at his watch, she was certainly taking her time coming through, it was 20 seconds after the opening of the ground bridge.

"Damn it, I don't want to open this again, she's got 20 more seconds before we will have to re-open it, and that's a pain in the ass.." Professor Alan spoke to the guards.

He huffed and crossed his arms. There was one entrance and exit into the base of Mech, and that was where the ground bridge opened, just inside of it. No underground tunnels were ever suspected so it was a chance that the Decepticons had to take. One last huff and the professor finally saw a shadow in the light making its way through.

"Finally! It's about ti-"

The professor spoke and stopped suddenly, the blood in his face dropping dramatically and he became very pale. Kirsten stood in front of him with three large bombs attached to her body, she was shaking and pale. The guards and the professor all stood still in defense. They held their guns toward her but the professor quickly stopped them from acting.

"Stop, do NOT shoot those things!" The professor called out.

His eyes never left Kirsten's pale eyes, and he calmly said, "Kindly...escort her out."

Upon his words, the magnet in her arm activated and she was hurled to the nearest wall, stuck. Kirsten was just as surprised as the others when she couldn't even detach herself from the wall. She had wondered in the midst of all that had happened in the last 24 hours if there was anything she could do to avoid any conflict..and just disappear. She pulled and grunted against the wall but it was useless. She felt an enormous pain in her arm as it smashed itself against the hard wall and then her emotions couldn't be contained anymore. She started sobbing, feeling weak and useless, "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"How long do we have?" The professor turned toward her and whispered.

"I don't know..." she whimpered back.

She heaved slightly from her gut, wanting to tell him what would happen if they went outside. But would it have helped? They would come inside if they didn't go out, and destroy her in the process. The outcome wouldn't be any different.

The professor turned to the guards and muttered one final word, "Evacuate."

The sirens in the base went off, red and white lights flickered in the hallways and Kirsten could hear the commotion of people. She turned her head toward the wall so she wouldn't have to look anyone in the face. Her head swirled with regret and sorrow, she slumped against the wall and hid her head in her free hand. She heard the footsteps of many people headed towards the only exit and the sirens dissipated their voices. She kept telling herself that there was no other way, but it didn't make her feel any less guilty. She wondered if she had sacrificed herself and not agreed to it, had she have told them that the bombs were fake...would anything be different?

The footsteps from behind her became less and the entire base was emptied before long, and before she could think, the sirens were the only thing left that she could hear. The sirens rang in her head so loud that it was almost silent. Kirsten raised her head and looked around, there was no one. She wondered where in the base she was, she wondered if the corridor to the outside was really that long that she couldn't hear the screams of the people evacuated. But then she felt the vibrations. She felt the footsteps of the giants from above her. The base, of course, it was underground, she thought. She shook with anxiousness still wondering if she was going to get out alive as she watched the ceiling shake and eventually start to crumble a little bit. She bit her lip.

Every vibration made the ceilings crack just a little more, she knew they would start to collapse with this kind of activity, she tried to pull her arm away from the wall again, nothing. She screamed in frustration. She ripped her long sleeve shirt trying to get her arm away from the wall, but bomb containers and strength of the magnet was too overpowering for her small body, and she fell limp in defeat. The sirens were echoing in her ears, they eventually went numb from the sound too. She was glad that she couldn't hear anything else, she only wished it was over. The sounds of the sirens and the flashing of the lights made her delirious and dizzy, she disappeared into a deep place in her mind, thinking back to her days at Catholic School. She hadn't attended in a while but she wanted to pray. Would it do any good, she thought?

She was pulled out of her thoughts suddenly by her arm dropping free from the hard wall. She stumbled over on the floor and the bomb containers rolled off of her too, just leaving the attachment device strapped on her. Kirsten's mind became very coherent as she got to her feet, remembering the next step of her quest. The stairway. She started running, the fastest she'd ever had, she didn't even realize until she was halfway to the safe-place that every piece of debris from the ceiling had failed to hit her, the forcefield she remembered. She was slightly comforted again, they had kept their promise to keep her safe, even though she had little hope through her many doubts.

But she felt very fatigued after she ran, her eyes fell upon the stairwell and she jogged to it. Knock Out said that the forcefield took a lot of energy, she knew what he meant now. It was like she was running through a mud pit, her feet were slow and she felt like a large rubber band was holding her back. Survival instinct kicked in again though and with one last large effort, she took those few more steps and then collapsed under the stairs as a large boulder bounced off from on top of her, she needed the forcefield to last. From under her haven, she saw the entire roof collapse in before she finally passed out.

* * *

It had been hours, long, hot hours. The dust had settled with the exception of small wisps of wind agitating the debris. Large metal hands dug. They dug under the rubble of the building and earth. Red eyes searched, almost panicked that he wouldn't be able to find her under all the debris but then finally located the stairwell. Aha. Long metallic fingers reached into the dirt and destruction and felt the smaller creature and lifted her up and out, trying not to damage her anymore than she might have already been. He cradled her into his arms and scanned her body with a device. After being satisfied with the results, he stood up and looked around for a beacon, where had the ship gone, he wondered. He looked off in the distance, they had traveled east at a fast pace. He communicated back with the deck and let them know he had found her and he was on his way back. He looked down at her and cursed slightly and then he transformed, gently folding her into his seat and drove west to be transported back to the ship. The sporty red and white car drove as fast as he could go, for he had to make his way back fast for when the others returned to the ship so that he could tend to their repairs.

* * *

"What the hell do I know? I can't get communication back!" A drone spoke to another.

"Lord Megatron do you read?" another one said.

"Damn..." The bridge was busy with trying to locate all of their troops, including Megatron.

One of the attacks hadn't gone quite to plan, the one in Australia.

"Bridge coordinates to him, send reinforcements!" Dreadwing commanded after returning from his own sting operation on the east coast. But just as he ordered the command, a communications link came through from Megatron.

"Dreadwing, bridge me to the ship, now!"

Dreadwing hurried the drones on to capture Megatron's signal, though it was much slower without Soundwave who was also missing in action. Kirsten awoke to the scurry of the Decepticons. She opened her eyes to a fuzzy blur of drones running and the solid sound of clicking and beeps. She tried to sit up, her arm and back muscles failing to work anything but slowly and shifty. She realized that she was back on the Nemesis. Alive. A sudden overwhelming feeling of 'thankgod' overcame her, and she had never felt so happy to breath the thin air at 25,000 feet. It looked to her like things were still pretty active on the ground, she was sitting on an unused transmissions table on the side of the bridge, away from all the commotion. Had Soundwave just dumped her at the nearest space and then left again? At least he had made time to come get her. She couldn't remember anything from the time when she was detached from the wall until now but she was relieved.

A ground bridge opened and a grumpy and stumbling Megatron appeared in the room and roared. "Gaah, damn Autobots!" He threw his hands in the air, transformed a gun that was on his left arm and smashed them clean against the nearest communications computer, sending broken bits and particles across the room.

"Have we heard from Soundwave yet?" He grumbled loudly.

"No sir, he still has not responded."

Kirsten's ears perked, wait, what? She turned her head to them, feeling slightly invisible being out of the main lighting of the room.

"We have his location but we just can't seem to find him."

"And I couldn't either.." Megatron said solomnly. "With the Autobot's sudden appearance, all we can do is wait. He's underground, I know it. But there's no way to take the time to dig, and the ground bridge can't assume that position."

Kirsten looked at the main screen, it showed Soundwave's icon in the blunt middle of Australia. She pondered for a minute, he was still on the other side of the planet, she thought, he couldn't have possibly been there to pick her up. Then who had come to her rescue?

"Get the rest of the troops out of there, bridge them all back, the job is at least done. Give the Autobots time to parry." Megatron sneered."They have compassion for human life but if I were them, I'd give an exception to MECH, they don't know what they got themselves into."

The troops complied and opened the bridge in the middle of the deck room and slowly they scattered in, some of them beaten and some smoking. Kirsten shifted on her knees to watch them pile in, hoping one of them would be Soundwave. Her eyes narrowed on the green light, still nothing. She turned to look at the icon on the screen that was Soundwave in relation to the opened ground bridge, but it didn't move. Her forehead wrinkled in worry.

Megatron caught sight of the small human sitting in the side corner of the room, anxious worry that was focused on Soundwave's icon blanketed her face. Megatron didn't like the fact that Soundwave had gone missing either, and he shared a feeling of concern with her when she didn't move from that position for a long moment after. He almost confessed to himself that her persistent attention to Soundwave's well-being, was gratifying. She must care for him more than he thought previously.

An hour passed.

The Decepticons had left her alone, or had not seen her, but she didn't know what else to do but just sit and wait. It was because of Soundwave that she was still here anyway, and if he was gone...then she would be sure she would be too. She felt her fate rest in Soundwave's life. She also grieved, and it felt strange to her. But she had become part of this team, so why shouldn't she? Her complex mixed feelings about their entire situation mulled in her mind over and over again. Was she really feeling close to Soundwave, or was it just exposure therapy? Had he really made her feel those things that she felt, or was it just for the moment? Why had this become so hard...She rubbed her arms gingerly and bent over her knees, still keeping her eyes on the screen, waiting for the icon to move. No one else was watching as intently, so why not be the one to keep an eye on it.

"Soundwave has never failed a mission, so I wouldn't expect such outcomes even now." Megatron was suddenly beside her, watching the screen with her.

She sighed heavily and sat up slightly straighter with his words.

"Your worry insults him." Megatron continued.

Kirsten turned those words over in her head. 'your worry insults him'?...she frowned and then realized what he meant. He was right. If she believed in Soundwave's ability, then there shouldn't be any need to worry. In an odd kind of way, Megatron was like the ultimate male role model, teaching her strength when she needed it, and then teaching her confidence when she lacked it. She had become much stronger than she'd have ever imagined in the past few months.

"I'm afraid if I stop worrying, that I'll cease to care as well." she said back to him, giving him a small explanation of her concern.

"Stop being so afraid then." He said softly in his gruff voice.

She thought, and sat very still, and then nodded her head in acknowledgment to him. He was always right.

"Sir!" a drone yelled to Megatron, "A weak bridge link from Soundwave, proceeding to open!" Kirsten perked and she witnessed the icon on the screen move just slightly, and the green dot of the bridge appearing beside it. She turned her body to face the middle of the deck and Megatron did the same and a smouldering and battered Soundwave fell through the green light onto the hard floor of the bridge. Kirsten had never felt such relief, not even when she realized her own life had been saved when awakening on the ship.

She reached out but couldn't, so she stood on her hands and knees beside Megatron's large body. It looked like he took a large blow to the right side of his body, mostly his shoulders and head. The bladed shoulders that shielded his head were mangled and his visor had been damaged and broken. Kirsten saw what she and most other Decepticons had never seen before.

A red, glowing eye peered slantwise out of the broken part of the strong glass, and it searched the floor below him as he kneeled on his legs and hands. Soundwave located Megatron's large form and the visible eye focused on him and then to the small human kneeling beside him. He looked at them from the side, not moving any part of his body, including his head. Kirsten peered at his eye as he peered back, she could now see a face behind that visor, if only just a small portion of it. His emotions couldn't be distinguished to know if he was in pain or not. If she were to choose, he looked angry more than anything, but through the damage on his face from whatever it was that hit him, it was hard to see.

Soundwave felt vulnerable with part of his face exposed like that. Perhaps for a good reason, perhaps for a reminder. For himself, perhaps, for a brief moment of reflection in a certain small human female's wonderous eyes. It also served a reminder to Megatron, of their final fight, where Megatron bestowed ubiquitous respect to him after defeating him. Megatron looked beyond his eye and towards the scars that started below and then hid underneath the rest of the visor, seeing a part of him forever in Soundwave.

"Someone get him to the med bay!" Megatron finally said. It had seemed like forever, but it had only been a few seconds that Kirsten had locked real eyes with him, and Soundwave was quickly scooped up and hauled to Knock Out's room to undergo repairs. Kirsten was left alone on the communications keyboard as the rest of them went about their business, talking of suspicions of Soundwave's disappearance and Megatron retreating to a long corridor in the back of the bridge.

She was almost at a loss of what to do. Now that the entire attack was over, what next? They wanted her to join them as a faux-Decepticon. A gangly human in a titan's body. She shook the thought from her mind and jumped off of the ledge she was on and stumbled to the floor. It was a bit higher than she had anticipated. What she really wanted to do was see Soundwave. Would it hurt to just make her way non-chalantly to Knock Out's room? They had left her alone anyways, why not be free to roam as they so trusted her to do.

* * *

Knock Out had three patient tables full. He didn't have enough hands. His frustrating running back and forth from one mech to another was enough to make one maniacal. And then Soundwave was delivered. In the middle of re-attaching a trooper's chestplate, he glanced at the drones dragging in Soundwave's body and he cursed and vented.

"Seriously?" Knock Out looked around the room, all of the tables were being used. Too bad for Trooper #27, Knock Out unbuckled him and shoved him out of the room, Soundwave had priority and they all knew it. He would just have to wait.

"What in the wide world of Primus happened..." Knock Out said to him and the other drones helped him get the bigger mech onto the table and layed him back at a 45 degree angle. Knock Out looked over Soundwave's right shoulder and the broken face mask. He was astonished to say the least to see a partial part of his actual face. It was grey like a normal mech with glowing red eyes like a normal Decepticon, but the layers of four very distinct scars that teased the edges of where the broken visor began were explicitly his.

Soundwave's eye traced the room, it had been a while since he'd seen Knock Out's room without his visor on. It looked much more dull and simple. Everything did. He remembered why he wore the mask and why he wasn't as good without it. If he was just a simple drone, it would be pointless, but his visor was everything. Contrary to popular belief, he had nothing to hide. He couldn't have cared less for the cosmetic scars that marred his face. He at one time could have had his other eye repaired, but it was much more efficient to install a bio-mechanical seeking device in place of it. His visible eye began to squint with the repairs Knock Out began to perform on his shoulder. It was painful, but not that painful. His pride wouldn't be hindered by this crude act of unjustified violence.

A small shadow of a form caught his interest in the doorway, and he saw a half a face peek around the corner. Kirsten looked at him with the peeking eye, mimicking his own single eye. He watched as her fingers curled around the corner to steady herself and she then rested her face on her hand. He wondered if she was angry. Her eyebrows said otherwise. They weren't furrowed like he expected them to be if she was angry, she looked more curious. As they exchanged looks, Kirsten wondered if he minded her looking at him exposed, when he had taken such lengthy steps to hide his face.

For a second time, their eyes met and she actually felt him looking at her and not just toward her. He did notice her. He did see her. She felt an even bigger sigh of relief. She slowly retreated back from the doorway and made her way to her residence on the ship, wondering if even that would be put into jeopardy now that the mission was over. There was so much more to discuss, and she was willing to wait patiently now that she knew 100% that she could trust the Decepticons. They had spared her her life and she was free to ponder her future and what the least she could do for them would be.


	19. A Decision

**a/n: very modified from the original chapter that was full of very graphic scenes in my attempt to get this back to a romance instead of a smut. I apologize to anyone who wants to come back and read this for that reason alone:) moving on! 2/13  
**

Ch 19 A Decision

Countless hours of thinking had led Kirsten to eventually pass out in her bed. She wondered if it were to be her bed for too much longer. What was in store for her tomorrow, or the next day? She realized that nothing could revert back to the way it was before she took the job. She thought about the Decepticons, and then she would think about the government, the government knew everything. They would hunt her down and get information. She rubbed her itchy nose against her arm and she snuggled in closer to the bear that Ann had given her. And what about Ann? She wondered about her.

Soundwave had been under Knock Out's care for a long time now, Kirsten thought about the damage done to him. She couldn't get the image of him falling out of the ground bridge and collapsing on the floor with his broken visor out of her head. Something horrible and strong must have hit him at very close range. She shuddered with the thought of it.

Wishing there was something that she could do, she sat up on the bed and wished she had some kind of activity to do, she wondered if she could pass the time again by creating another surfboard out of the scrap metal around...

* * *

Soundwave winced at the re-locating of his shoulder joint and the sparks flying into his revealed eye from Knock Out's laser. It had been a grueling day for him, luckily for the both of them, he didn't require any life support methods.

"So ugngh..." Knock Out heaved his heavy shoulder back in place and started re-routing the wires and cables exposed from the injury., "It looks like you got his with a..." Knock Out wiped some burnt residue from his wing, "...hmm, a G50 Plasma ray hammer." He shook his head and cursed Mech.

Soundwave nodded his head in response to Knock Out's guess.

"Close range...did you lose consciousness?" Knock Out asked.

Soundwave nodded again.

"Was that before or after you contacted me to get the girl?"

Soundwave thought for a moment, he actually didn't know and his mind logged nearly everything. Looking down towards his extended legs, he tried to remember what transpired between getting shot and regaining consciousness while in a deep hole in the earth. He shrugged.

"Hmm, memory processor problems, I'll have to look at that after I'm done with this. Getting shot in the head is no minor issue."

What pissed Soundwave off the most was how he even got shot, he moved with stealth and covert methods, and still somehow managed to nearly get his face blown off. He clenched his fingers into a ball and the wide span of his arm twitched with anger. His eye looked upward, reminding himself to stay focused and not to lose control. He figured it may have just been an accidental shot that happened to hit the right place at the right time, there was no way that they could have seen him. He rolled his eye in frustration.

Knock Out was quite impressed with how active Soundwave's optic was, he looked quite normal again, like he remembered him being a long long time ago. He always assumed Soundwave had disabled his emotions, he had just assumed that he was a cold, private, mysterious mech who did more than his share of duty next to Megatron's side. It seems that he was just really good at keeping face. Knock Out covertly watched Soundwave's eye move about the room, not too overtly, but wincing and furrowing, deep in thought about whatever he was processing at the time.

Soundwave quickly lost interest in the room and slowly but surely found his mind wandering to things that comforted him as he was being worked on. Strength comforted him, to know that he was strong was a big accomplishment in Decepticon territory. Respect, he had always been well respected. And lately, desired. One psychological need that he didn't realize would help him, the girl had led him to explore. It wasn't before long his processor took the thoughts and ran wild with them.

He had never felt the need to follow the conventional rituals that many Cybertronians took to their partners. Why wasn't one partner every now and then good enough? He felt plenty content after femme companionship but never felt the need to explicitly choose only one. It was a silly concept. He was processing that it certainly had its advantages, knowing one would always be around, but what if one didn't want constant companionship, what if being a solitary drifter was enough.

But...what if it wasn't...he thought.

Desired. He needed to be useful, to be worth the time. If it wasn't worth it, then there was no point. How did she do it? How did she do this...to me, he thought.

Knock Out could have sworn a whispered curse escape from underneath Soundwave's visor just then.

* * *

It had already been two days. Two days and Kirsten hadn't left the gateway room. Trying to find things to do was the hardest part of it all. She couldn't get internet access, she couldn't find any materials right enough to make into another surfboard, at least she still had a stock of cold canned soup.

She had climbed the stairs to the large keyboard on Soundwave's workstation and tapped her fingers lightly on it. She wondered if it was locked. She touched a key. The screen went red and green and pulled up Soundwave's latest documentations. The energy swirled around her as she touched more keys. It wasn't like Soundwave not to lock his workstation, but, she wondered if she should take the chance to explore. Her answer was eventually answered when she didn't pull herself from the keys.

…

From Knock Out's room, Soundwave picked up activity from his workstation. He tapped into the Nemesis' survelleince system remotely and locked onto the room. Unfortunately, without the visor over his right eye, he couldn't see the video feed as well, the only thing he could do was pick up traces of outlines and heat. Once he locked on, he could see what was the source of the activity, and what was being looked at.

Kirsten. He had multiple angles of the room, he saw her outline standing at his keyboard, Her head, chest, and abdomen radiated the most heat but he could make out her hands moving along the rims of the keys. His final pondering was, what was she looking at?

…

Kirsten sighed and began to type in the Cybertronian symbols, hopefully translating correctly. It always went slow, it was much easier for her to translate Cybertronian to English than the other way around. She typed in her own name, her symbol, and searched Soundwave's database. She was surprised anything was in there at all, assuming most of her time there would be "off the records" as one would put it. But no, there were a few things, not a lot. If she read the labels correctly, one particular document caught her interest. She opened it.

It read: Human-Cybertronian biotransfer. The document started out explaining the causes and reasons for a 'biotransfer'. Low population, scattered communities, rebuilding the species even though not in a pure-bred form.

'Really..?' Kirsten thought. There were so many biological things that didn't make sense to her about the Cybertronians. As close as they looked to robots in her world, they were very much a real and legitimate type of animal. A coincidence of evolution perhaps. Scrolling down, she saw a diagram of a prototype form, it looked very similar to the prototype body that Megatron had shown her. There were things that she didn't understand and science that eluded her in the documentation but the diagram was pretty self-explainatory. A multi-cell reproduction that would take place as a copy of the original, the living metal would take the form of the original DNA. Memory transfer, circuitry and nerve transfer, it was all there.

Kirsten read further at some test experiments that had already been conducted. There had been three, the first one didn't survive, the second one became deranged and had to be destroyed, and the third, was a success but they had to terminate him. Kirsten flinched, wondering why. She approached the end of the document, a fourth study was to be conducted soon. She felt her nerves start to tingle as she read on, seeing the label of the fourth chapter starting with the symbols of her name. That's where the document ended.

…

Soundwave made sure to pay very close attention to Kirsten's body language since he couldn't see her expressions with his disabled remote vision. Relying solely on her heat and outline, he could only imagine that she was introduced to the idea of becoming a Decepticon again, but scientifically this time. She didn't move much in the process, which meant that she was intrigued and paying close attention. He was almost glad that she was reading it, it saved him from trying to explain it, which was much more efficient.

He watched her heat rise in her abdomen as she read the multi-cell biotransfer, she was nervous, or contemplating. And most intriguing to him was the way the heat suddenly shifted to the rest of her body when she read that she, herself, could possibly be the next. He was almost certain that her consideration was becoming more positive than ever. He knew the choice she would make, seeing her not protest in her body. As desirable as she was now, he thought of how much more desirable she would be, as one of them. He grinned inside, becoming warm with the thought, thinking of how much more enjoyable being 'efficient' was going to become in the near future.

* * *

At the end of that second day, Knock Out had completed Soundwave's repairs and he all but jumped off the working table and quickly pounded his way out of the room upon Knock Out's dismissal. Soundwave couldn't fathom spending another hour with Knock Out, who's persistent complaining was enough to drive him maniacal. He had one thing on his mind, not about to deny the fact that he was ready to start on the other project, putting Kirsten I within their ranks forever. All of the thoughts that had been mulling around in his mind while trapped on the doctor's table had him excited.

Walking tall and proud down the corridor, his instincts clouded his mind. He almost felt the need to coach himself into a more manageable mood before barging into the room demanding an answer. He became frustrated. He thought to himself, it will be so much easier when she became a Cybertronian like him. No more stepping gingerly, no more crap in the corner of his room and perhaps morose serious contemplation of companionship. Cybertron was lost, and so was the hope of finding others. Sometimes, adaptations had to be made.

Kirsten heard the door open behind her, she swiftly turned her head, flailing her hair around her shoulders and met Soundwave's interrogating gaze at the entrance. She was excited, never had she been so excited to see him, and before she knew that the words were coming out of her mouth, they had already been said.

"Soundwave, I'm so glad you're back!" She breathed heavily in relief and clasped her hands over her left breast, admitting to herself that she might have sounded too breathy, but she didn't care.

He sauntered slowly to her, his shoulders and hip joints rocking with every step, coming toward her passively-aggressively. She heard the door lock when it closed.

"N-not that I was worried..." she continued as she remembered what Megatron said.

Soundwave scoffed inside, 'worried? About him?' Although it was a more tricky situation than he'd like to admit, he wondered why she would seemingly worry. Desire, possibly? Want? The thought tightened his cables even more and the closer he came to her, the more she glowed in his indigo light.

Kirsten didn't break eye-visor contact with him, feeling her strength from the inside move throughout her body. She felt strong, and empowered. She was worth something to them. To him. He had spared her life for a reason, what that reason may be, still nagged at her. Whether or not the reason was to become one of them, she was ready to give an answer.

Soundwave stopped closely in front of her, towering over her head as she stood on the platform facing him. His chest was in reaching distance, his body was warm, becoming hotter. Her eyes darted around his chest facets, pondering. She remembered the way he touched her face so gently the last time they came into contact, how it aroused that beautiful feeling from in her belly. The feeling wasn't foreign, she desired to feel him again. But before that, she had to tell him.

Soundwave wondered why she was taking so long to get the hint. He wanted her, and he wanted her to want him back. Did she not feel challenged anymore? He watched her brain activity suddenly increase, and her eyes were all over his chest plates. He relaxed, giving her time to think about it. He decided that it would be wiser to keep her contented and comfortable in order to produce the most desirable outcome, and then she would agree to be their fourth study. Take it, he prodded with his mind.

Kirsten closed her eyes against the warmth of his body, feeling her body temperature rise physically and physiologically. A unique and strange situation had developed in this room over time. There was something that she wanted to keep, a feeling of comfort and strength that Soundwave made her feel, and then there were some things she didn't. Most of all she was scared of the unknown. Her face reflected the fear she was feeling and Soundwave leaned into her when he noticed her brow starting to change shape. The warmth from his body drew her closer and she let herself succumb to it by leaning forward and brushing the feathery tip of her nose against his nearest chest facet. She wanted to remember him like this.

That was all Soundwave needed. He crouched and leaned forward, his body crept away from Kirsten's touch but the space between them was not bare for long as Soundwave tilted his head forward and down to her head. A sly finger pulled the hair from her shoulder. The warmth that Soundwave emitted defied the cold from bothering her as he closed the gap between them and he buried the smooth plate of his visor into the small crevice of her neck, documenting every scent, touch, and composite.

Kirsten tilted her head to the side, letting Soundwave's smooth plate rub against her shoulder and neck, comforted in knowing that there were eyes behind the glossy surface, looking at her, watching her. She took her arms and rubbed the smooth surface with her soft fingers, feeling the precise chemistry and machinery used to construct the visor and the rest of his head armor, the cold warm metal against her palm was incredibly stimulating. In her mind she rolled over the same thoughts continuously, how had this happened, and why would she want to leave this ever?

She couldn't do it. She pushed his visor away and took a step back. Soundwave thought nothing of the gesture, he was certain that she was just as anxious as he was. He didn't expect her to skip down the stairs though so suddenly and hide her face for a while. He was starting to wonder if there was going to be a problem. She stood with her back to Soundwave for a few seconds longer and then turned to him, her straight gaze falling upon his knee joint.

Soundwave kneeled again on one leg, crouching his head low so that she could see her reflection in his visor. Other than the obvious, what did Soundwave want from her, she thought. How had she suddenly become the poster child for bio-transfers. They shared some sort of mutual attraction but did that attraction come with the same definition for them both?

How could she ever surf again if she stayed. When would she visit her family for the holidays? How would her mom react? Kirsten rubbed her eyes, her mom was never impressed by the boys that caught her attention.

Soundwave tapped his finger against the ground and tilted his head, provoking conversation. Kirsten also wondered, if she would still be his subordinate, always under his control.

"I'm listening." she said softly to him. He didn't display anything back to her. He just waited. Kirsten huffed and her eyes darted sideways. On the plus side, she would get to see things that no one else would ever see, feel things that no one else would ever feel, and experience things that would only be imagined by many.

Soundwave finally displayed her body next to the diagram of the prototype's body. There was no escaping the question now. Kirsten had to give him an answer. Her stomach felt faint and weak, her cheeks started to tingle with anxiousness and her arms became dotted with goosebumps as she formulated the answer in her mind. Her mouth curved and slowly the breath intended as a sound... formulated into an answer..." No."

Soundwave became stiff immediately. His processor was turned backwards and his body under his armor became rigid.

"I can't." she whispered, feeling the salty sting of tears build in her eyes. She dropped her eyes to the ground, not wanting to feel his gaze penetrating her. Soundwave didn't move. He was stunned, sure that she was going to say yes and then they could have started on the process the next day after some rest. He had even notified Knock Out and Megatron of the upcoming project. He leaned forward, demanding an explanation, curling his shoulders over his head, deepening his crouch.

Kirsten was assaulted by his intrusive gaze, she rubbed her forehead intently. "I don't want to." she said shakily.

Soundwave felt something drop in his gut, his vents slowed and the energon pulse that ran through his life veins nearly froze. She had denied the Decepticon cause. He couldn't blame her, it wasn't her species, but ..he felt betrayed. His best just wasn't good enough.

"It's not my life..." she continued softly as she turned around from him, her back facing Soundwave.A long moment of silence that chilled the room passed over them both.

Eventually, Soundwave got to his feet quickly and stomped to his workstation, and began to frantically type. An unexpected green light opened in front of her. Soundwave had changed the coordinates of the ground bridge in a split second and a swirling green light for just about her size opened in the room. He waited for her to disappear.

Kirsten was confused at his anger while reality suddenly hit her. She realized that this was it, it was time to go home. And after she was off this ship she was on her own again. She might never see Soundwave again, or any of them. What could she say to him to comfort his nerves. She didn't want to leave so fast but, why stick around?

She put together a goodbye speech quickly in her head, but before she could administer it, Soundwave took the blunt side of his arm and pushed the platform that Kirsten had used for months forcefully to the side and smashed it with the sharp edge of his elbow joint. It slowly crumpled under his weight and staggered to the ground with a loud noise.

By the time that the clamor of the crashed platform and stairway had diminished, Soundwave was the only one left in the room. He turned his head sideways to gaze at the empty floor and then shut the bridge.

**a/n: I know, so sad! *sniff* but don't worry, there's more to come...;)**


	20. Solitary Islands

**A/N: OMG Thank you all for such great reviews and a tremendous amount of following! ALL OF YOU! I know, I'm so mean! What would a romance be without a dramatic hiccup though:P I love throwing your warm heart and star filled eyes down and punching them and ripping them in two! Sorry, I digress. I love yo' faces! *heart* ~K**

Ch 20 Solitary Islands

Her apartment was cold.

As winter had set in, the thermostat was still set low and she shivered alone in the dark room. It smelled like her old apartment, but it felt different. Maybe it was because she was different now. The first thing she wanted to do was call her parents and let them know that she was back. They didn't need to know the specifics, just that she'd been away on a top-secret mission, right? Just like the professor said? What she didn't think through was the fact that things didn't turn out like the government had planned. Oh shit. And she wondered if they knew that she was instrumental in MECH's demise.

'Oh fuck it...' Kirsten became sick with the thought. She needed company, she knew what would happen if she was stuck thinking for too long by herself. She walked to the wall with a light switch and turned it on, wishing she didn't. When she had first been abducted, they had certainly made a mess of her place. Her bookcases were knocked over, her chairs were destroyed, and her surfing trophies were broken.

She quickly shut the lights off. 'Shit, what if they were watching.' She didn't know who she meant by 'they' but there had to be someone out there watching, right? She couldn't risk staying. She quickly made her way to her bedroom in the dark, tripping over other broken pieces of furniture in her way. Paranoia rising, she felt out her closet handle and got a heavy duffel bag off the bottom shelf. She started to throw random clothing into the bag, not being able to see what she was grabbing. She didn't want to risk turning on the lights again just in case someone was watching to see if she was home or not. Her mind overflowed with a dementia from the shock of everything changing so suddenly and her thoughts became disconnected and raw.

She would split the complex just as soon as she-. She sighed and slowly fell to her knees on her messy floor, rubbing her face with her dry hands. '...what was the use.'

They would eventually find her anyway. She stopped and focused on breathing, thinking of possible ways to get out of this situation. It was MECH, it was the government...there was no hiding from them. Getting up, she shuffled her feet around on her carpet and then made her way to the kitchen, slowly. She opened the refrigerator and found most everything spoiled. Great. A few cans of soda and some beer were on the bottom shelf. She reached for the beer.

Making her way across the dark floor, her mind wandered, she supposed she'd just wait it out, with a beer. She unlocked her balcony door and stepped outside and flopped into her sunbathing chair. The damp night chilled her through her clothing. In the distance she could hear the waves slamming against the jetties. On the Nemesis or the ground, she doubt she'd ever hear the ocean ever again once someone got their hands on her.

Odd, she noticed a pile of blankets that she didn't remember leaving on the corner of her balcony before. She stared at the dark pile, in the shadow of the moonlight and had a strange feeling. She reached her foot out and prodded the pile with her foot. Expecting something to pop out but then expecting something not to because that would be stupid, but she screamed when a fuzzy red head popped up and looked at her.

"WHATTHEFUCK ANN!" she whisper-screamed and bounced onto her toes backing away from her, bumping into her surfboards leaning against the railing, certain that her heart would leap out of her throat. She spilled her beer on her shoes and looked to the young redheaded teenager for answers.

"Sorry! Sorry, I can explain!" Ann said, defensively holding her hands up.

"Jesus, j-just get inside, it's fucking cold!" Kirsten said and helped her up out of her bed of blankets. Ann picked up a laptop and a small bag and hurried inside after Kirsten. After they were inside, Ann dropped her bag and opened up her laptop in her arms.

"I've gotta charge this thing." she said as she walked around in the darkness. She bumped into a shortboard Kirsten had laying next to the wall and tripped over it.

"Careful, that's a Firewire!" Kirsten almost pulled her hair out when she heard the board fall on it's face. She was baffled at the least as to what Ann was most concerned about at that particular moment.

"Ann, are you safe? This is not safe here!" Kirsten whisper-yelled at her again. Ann ignored her. Kirsten, though never was a big sister, felt like one now. She crunched her hair in her hand and shook her head, "Why were you on my balcony?"

Ann opened something up on her computer after she plugged it in and then turned her innocent eyes to Kirsten. Kirsten remembered that Professor Alan was in the attack. "Oh geez kid..."

"I didn't know where else to go." Ann said. "And your information was on file. So I came here."

"You don't have any other family, Ann?"

"Yeah, but they live in Pennsylvania, I'm not going there!" she said in much protest, turning back to her computer and searching for something. "The base was only like, 50 miles south of here."

"I'm...I'm so sorry about your dad.." Kirsten said with regret.

"My dad? You mean my uncle." She shrugged. "He deserved it."

"Don't say things like that! No one deserves that!" Kirsten became upset with her unconcerned attitude.

"I'm sorry.." Ann said softly. They both sat down on the messy floor, Kirsten sipped her beer and Ann stared at her screen. "Here." Ann turned her laptop around to show Kirsten. Kirsten read what Ann had to show her. It was an database collection of interrogations and condemning material on the Autobots and Decepticons, and also humans.

"Ann...what is this?" Kirsten asked dumbfounded.

"It's my job." she said.

"Job... you're only what 15, 16?"

"14. Before you were hired by my uncle, he asked me to deliver things around the base before they got real secret, like a minion. I stole and copied a lot of stuff because I felt weird about the whole thing. It's a compilation of evidence against MECH to try them in a lawful setting for torture, murder, slander, fraud...you name it."

"Like...a self-proclaimed job?" Kirsten was astonished at the amount of information she had collected, all of it looked legitimate, the copies of emails, the scans of documents, the conversation logs...

"And here's the best part." Ann leaned toward her and scrolled to a specific area, "This is where MECH mentions their affiliation with the US, Australian, and German governments and there's more down here..."

"You have enough evidence to incriminate the entire system, Ann..." Kirsten said slowly, still astonished at Ann's own betrayal to MECH. She wanted to hug her, but refrained.

"I need to make safe copies though, Kirsten," Ann tucked stray dyed red hairs behind her ears, "This is the only copy I have..." she looked worried.

"Don't worry.." Kirsten got up from the floor and found her own laptop and the small flash drive that was stuck in it.

Kirsten helped Ann copy the documents onto the drive and locked it securely with passcodes. They sat for several minutes in the darkness watching the files upload and once they finished, Kirsten reached for her laptop and opened it to go through her contacts and copy those also to the flash drive. Before she opened it, she rummaged around in the dark room and found her router and unplugged it. She didn't need any unnecessary attraction from connecting to the internet...just in case.

Unfortunately, it didn't do much good, as soon as her desktop appeared, it went blank.

"What the-" Kirsten became confused. "Oh shit..." she whispered. Ann leaned in beside her to see what was going on.

"They've connected you remotely!" Ann said, and pointed to a small icon in the left corner of the screen, "MECH!"

"Shhh.." Kirsten said, and pushed her away, hoping that if anyone was going to be taken down, it was only going to be one of the two of them.

"Hello Kirsten." the computer said, and a video eventually popped up that she couldn't click on or close. Kirsten thought in lightning speed, 'at first play dumb, no that's stupid, be nice,'...

"Hello?" Kirsten questioned softly, waiting for their answer. It was a crisp clear picture of a masked man facing the camera. She cursed herself still, thinking they had hacked into her computer and connected to another hot spot nearby.

"Kirsten, this is MECH." the masked man said. "We need to invite you in for some questions."

Kirsten nodded, she wanted to make sure that they knew that she had heard about the attacks, she couldn't play that dumb and get away with it.

"Okay." she said hesitantly.

"We're certain that you have heard about the MECH base you work for has been attacked and there were no survivors. You were in direct contact with the Decepticons the time that this happened, we need your information."

"What do you want me to do?" Kirsten asked calmly and somewhat carefully, "I have been abandoned by the Decepticons and have no contact with them anymore, they would have killed me too if had they the chance."

"How did you escape, Kirsten? How did you manage to escape the Decepticons successfully and get back to your apartment in such speedy time?"

Kirsten thought about the truth, and the truth was brutally close to the lie she told. "They sent me as bait. They had no compassion for my life or soul, hoping that I would be crushed to death. I happened to know their plans and I avoided it by choosing the safest place to be. Then, I hitchhiked because I didn't know where else to go."

"I see, Kirsten. Why don't you come down to our lab, soon."

"I've answered your questions, I've delivered your documents for months, I'd like to just forget this ever happened and move on." Kirsten sighed.

"I'm afraid we can't do that. You see, you still have something we need. Knowledge, associations, information on the Decepticons. We will make it worth your time..." he lowered his head dramatically.

A million thoughts ran through Kirsten's head at once. If she betrayed the Decepticons, no one would win. If she went to their lab, they would cut off her right arm once they found out what was inside. If she did nothing, they would find her anyway with their government connections. She couldn't run from them.

"And well, to give you some incentive of urgency..." As the masked man stopped talking, he switched to a different camera to show her. Kirsten's eyes widened at the scene. They had found her parent's house, she could see a live feed of them from a camera somewhere in space, overlooking a bay. Her dad, with the sandy sun-bleached hair and leathery tan, the man who taught her to surf, and her mom, her greying brown curls cascading down her back, they sat out on their porch together on their swing with glasses of wine, their arms intertwined, they laughed.

"They look so happy." she could hear the man's voice say, "It would be a shame if something happened to them."

"You sonofabitch!" Kirsten roared at him, "They have nothing to do with this!" Kirsten's voice quivered and she felt anger overtake her like fire. She tried hard to heal the sting in her eyes but her anger was too strong for her to cry.

The masked man appeared on screen again. "They are fine, for now. But you see, to get you to us, you needed a reason to come to us." Kirsten noticed the small curled smile from under the fabric where his mouth was.

"Why can't you just come to me?" Kirsten huffed back. "I know you've got guys outside waiting to break down my door!"

"Kirsten, you miss the point. Our place is secure from the Decepticons, yours is not."

'What...' Kirsten blinked. 'Waitaminute...' She began to feel relieved to hear that, they still thought that she was still fighting on their side! Why didn't she think about it before! They didn't know that she had actually sided with the Decepticons against MECH. Her mind suddenly clicked on a light bulb, if it was deception they wanted to play with, deception they will get.

"Okay, fine." Kirsten said. "What if they find out I'm still alive, and follow me to your lab? I don't want anymore trouble than it's worth." Kirsten lied.

"That's why I'm going to give you specific directions to take to get here, we have taken that into account. Write this down."

The man gave her directions on where to get to the place that they were located. As she was writing, the thought that the organization couldn't even be big anymore, the Decepticons had taken out three of their main bases. They were threatened by low numbers.

"This is all in code!" Kirsten exclaimed, "How do you expect me to read this!?" Kirsten said in a faux-panic knowing full well that she would be able to do it.

"If you have trouble...just call your superior, Soundwave." He cracked another smile.

"I can't do that. They think I'm dead."

"You underestimate Soundwave, he knows a lot. Too much."

"Are you saying that you think that he knows that I'm still alive?" Kirsten asked, testing his knowledge.

"We have theories. We need Soundwave to go down."

"I understand." Kirsten said staring at the notes she had written.

"You have two days to get here and I've given you checkpoints along the way so that you don't stray."

"Will I-" Kirsten started saying but the man turned the communication off before she could finish her sentence.

Kirsten stared at the blank screen again, trying to find a way into her computer, but it looked like they had erased it. Kirsten looked up at Ann, who had been listening from a further distance. Kirsten picked up the computer calmly, walked it out to the door to the outside and chucked it off the balcony. She turned around to face Ann. "Well.. there, that's useless now." She said, brushing her hands off on her pants.

* * *

After Kirsten treated herself to a long, hot shower and cleansed herself properly for the first time in a long time, she didn't mind turning on the lights and making her presence known, now that she had successfully switched sides again, for the moment.

"What are you going to do now.." Ann asked her, drinking a Coke that Kirsten had in her refrigerator. They sat at Kirsten's kitchen table across from each other.

Kirsten tapped the table with her pencil, the message wasn't actually that hard to decode, it was just number-letter reversal. Kirsten sat back in her chair and thought. There were two routes she could take. One route would be to just give in to MECH and tell them what they wanted to know about the Decepticons. She figured the interest in Soundwave in particular though, was about his stealthy procedures and how he had figured out where their bases were located and his means on doing so, and that's why they needed to take him out.

On the other hand, Kirsten hated MECH. They were an abomination to the human race and deserved embarrassment or punishment for their criminal endeavors. She wished she could choose easily, but it was harder than she imagined. She wanted to save the risk of her parents getting involved. But saving her parents meant outing Soundwave and putting the rest of the Decepticons at risk for future attacks when they had more compassion for her own life than MECH did. She couldn't betray them like that. She couldn't betray Soundwave like that.

"I don't know." Kirsten said and rested her head in her hands with her elbows on the table.

"Could I help in any way?" Ann asked.

"You've already have, Ann, by helping me not go completely insane right now."

Ann smiled at the compliment and took another sip of Coke. "Just for the record, because I know you're curious... my wi-fi was turned off." she said happily.

Kirsten grinned at her goofy smile. "Thanks." she said.

* * *

Kirsten and Ann both stayed in the apartment that night. Kirsten had deciphered the directions and Ann agreed to stay behind should anything take place there, much to Ann's reluctance hoping that she would get to travel with Kirsten. Kirsten tried to explain to Ann that she'd be put in danger and would be more help in a separate location than herself. Wishing she could somehow help Ann get to her family in Pennsylvania, she couldn't devise any way that she could it deem safe if MECH found out where she was. She was only 14, Kirsten hated leaving her by herself, but what was she going to do otherwise?

Ann was a smart kid, Kirsten thought, but she knew leaving her alone was wrong. But then, she'd already done many wrong things lately. But she'd rather leave her safe in her apartment than get her killed along the way.

In the morning, Kirsten packed a backpack with few clothes and supplies.

"Bus to Nevada leaves at 9 am." She said aloud to Ann. The bus station was two miles away from her apartment, walking wouldn't take too long.

"I wonder, how many bases do they have left?" Ann said, trying to find something to eat in Kirsten's pantry.

"Who knows.." Kirsten stuffed a bottle of water in her coat pocket and turned to Ann, setting an envelope of saved up cash on the table for Ann to buy groceries. "Hey um..if I don't see you again..." Kirsten's words were muffled by sudden red hair in her face. Ann hugged her. Kirsten froze but then lifted her arms and hugged Ann in return.

"Thanks Kirsten." she said softly. "For letting me stay here."

"Promise me you'll find your family once I give you a sign that it's safe." Kirsten said. Ann nodded to her.

"Promise!" Kirsten forcefully said, not appeased with her nod.

"Okay fine! I promise." Ann said with that normal teenage whine.

"Don't turn on your phone yet." Kirsten told her as she opened her door to leave, "I'll... I don't know, I'll send you a sign somehow I guess." Kirsten sighed and waved.

"Bye.." Ann said.

Kirsten shut the door behind her and settled her backpack on her back. She crumpled the directions in her pocket and pulled them out, reviewing the message from MECH. Checkpoint one was in 24 hours in Reno. Skipping down the steps of her second-floor apartment, she listened closely to the California waves, hoping that the memory of the sound would giver her strength in the near future.

* * *

Somewhere above 25,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean, Soundwave regretted.

He regretted sending Kirsten away with her right arm still attached to her body, until now. MECH was always sloppy in their execution. He had listened to hers and MECH's conversation over the small hidden transmission he had installed in her wrist bundle. They weren't going to just let her free, he knew that, but he didn't know they would come after her, because of him. It didn't matter, he had stopped listening to the frequency as soon as she had stopped conversing with the man.

He couldn't do anything for her, she was on her own to make her decisions, and that's the way it should be. Until he and the Decepticons were directly jeopardized, there was nothing he could do.


	21. If ever I stray

**A/n: OOOH I'm sorry, I just couldn't help it, I had to publish it! Please enjoy, I'm enjoying writing it all! Lots of revelations in this chapter, plot continues to roll on...Who asked for 'Moar Soundwave face?' Well, shouldn't spoil the rest... LOVE YO FACES! *HEART* ~K**

Ch 21: If ever I stray

Knock Out passed by Soundwave's workroom and peeked in.

"Soundwave?" He asked the empty room. He wondered when this project would start, and where Kirsten was, where either of them were.

When he saw the collapsed platform, he suspected something had upset him. He looked to where her temporary housing was, it was gone. Soundwave had gotten rid of it all.

"Hmm.." Knock Out thought, and headed to the main bridge to find him.

Upon arriving, he found Soundwave and Megatron in conversation, one that it didn't look like he should interrupt.

Megatron looked down on him, looking through him with his piercing eyes. Soundwave's head was downcast in front of Megatron's and he eventually fell to kneel in front of him.

"We will find another." Megatron said to him. "Though trust being our main issue, it will be hard to find a replacement. Soundwave, I urge you to find any way to reconcile and convince our lost human of advantages that she will find in our army, if you can. With our receding numbers, I fear we may have no other options in the near future."

Soundwave nodded and stood, not having any intention of finding her on his own accord. He had already done everything he could do. Soundwave turned from Megatron and headed back towards the hull. Soundwave became ever closer to Knock Out as he was passing by and Knock Out blatantly asked what he wanted.

"Well, are we doing the project or not?" he said. Soundwave walked silently pass him, brushing his bladed arm harshly against Knock Out's shoulder and hand that he was holding up in inquiry, just to get the message across. Besides, he was in his way.

Knock out got the message, he didn't need an explanation from that.

Soundwave walked back to his own quarters and closed the door. Megatron didn't have to forgive him for letting her go alive, but he did. She knew a lot about them, and the ship, and their operations. She knew so many things that it almost scared him to think about it. How could he have been so naïve. He even began to doubt his trust in her. As he stood alone in his quarters, he knew she was on her way to MECH to convey all of her knowledge that they would eventually forcefully squeeze out of her. His own willpower was tempted at that very moment to just leave and kill her, but what held him back from doing so was a tiny thread of trust that he still had, and maybe a sliver of something else deeper than trust.

* * *

After a grueling 14 hour bus ride, Kirsten stepped up to the nearest payphone she could find, they were scarce, but she finally found one, and dialed the number that the MECH man had given her. After four rings, someone finally picked up, the line was silent for a few seconds then a voice spoke to her.

"I see you are punctual." It sounded like the same voice of the man who spoke to her on her computer.

"Now what?" she said, nearly in a whisper, darting her eyes around anxiously.

"Go to the Nomad's Inn and check in for the night, in the morning, I'll have instructions waiting at the front desk when you check out." The phone line disconnected after that.

Wishing she had her phone with her, wondering why she didn't take it in the first place, Kirsten went on the search for the inn. After asking for directions and walking a few blocks, Kirsten came up upon the Nomad's Inn, a...decent-looking place that was small with only about 10 rooms connected to its main building. 'Divey,' she thought. She checked in and went to her room, locking the door with all three locks that were provided.

Sitting on the questionable bed, her right arm felt weighted and fatigued. The metal installations were beginning to show their bearing in her body, and it didn't feel good. She fell backward on the bed and started dozing off with the lights on.

...

She didn't sleep well that night, waking up every hour, paranoid that something was going to break into her room while she slept. She awoke at dawn and brushed her teeth. She still hadn't devised a plan yet on how to handle the situation with MECH. Hoping that traveling would jar an idea, all it had done was made her regret not taking a place alongside the Decepticons, then she would have had the power to save her parents and Soundwave at the same time. Or... she wouldn't be in this difficult situation at all. She could only choose one with the way things were going, and she didn't like that decision.

She repacked her bag, slipping the flash drive copied from Ann's computer into her padded bra, feeling on edge about keeping it in the backpack, and made her way to the main building and walked to the front desk. A shady-looking businessman was sitting behind the desk, a burning cigar hanging out of his mouth.

"Room?" He said in a rough voice that seemed to gurgle.

"Eight." she replied.

He dug something out of the shelf behind him, and handed it to her. It was a blank envelope with a small note inside. She took out the small note and all it said was: Taxi outside. Get in.

Kirsten refolded the envelope and stuffed it in her side pocket. The man behind the desk seemed to not be interested in her anymore as he got up and walked to the back of the office. She exited the office and a minivan taxi was waiting on the curb. She opened the back door to the vehicle and got in.

The taxi drove east, she thought, based on the location of the sun, heading deeper into the northern Nevada desert.

* * *

Despite his regrets, Soundwave couldn't let Kirsten travel to another MECH lab without following her for their own advantage. A chance to learn and destroy another of MECH's bases would be beneficial for the Decepticons. He ignored the tremble that his spark fought every time he would lock onto her moving signal. In the main part of the bridge, Megatron walked up behind him.

"So, she is leading us to another base, how thoughtful." he sneered from behind him, "And disappointing. Soundwave, projected outcomes?"

Soundwave processed for a moment, but doubted himself for once in his long life. He didn't know, she had no pattern. Her trajectory was inconsistent, just like her decisions.

She bore Decepticon technology, she knew the ship and their weapons, she was able to use their keyboard, she knew his weaknesses, and MECH wanted him terminated. He could fire one shot and put a stop to the madness plaguing his processor. Or, he could wait and see what might transpire. He suddenly understood her inability to make a rational decision in a quick manner.

"Act wisely, Soundwave." Megatron commanded in a low, rough voice and turned to address something else across the main bridge.

Maybe her organic nature wasn't as inefficient as he had originally thought many months ago, and when an organic decision was solely based on an organic's manner of being, a mechanical, rational decision may not adequately be the best method. 'Act wisely...' Soundwave repeated in his head, and waited silently, frozen in front of the screen.

* * *

The rumble of the vehicle ascending a rocky trail jarred Kirsten awake. The window was fogged from her breath and she swept her stray bangs out of her eyes. They were driving up the edge of a small mesa, the landscape was barren and brown, only one communications tower in sight.

At the top of the trail, a small, metal building finally came into view, Kirsten knew this was it, she needed to figure out what she was going to do.

The taxi came to a halt in front of the building and Kirsten heard the voice of the driver say, "Out."

Kirsten followed directions and hopped out of the minivan.

"Leave that." he said when she flung her backpack over her shoulder. She set it on the dusty ground by the taxi and the man walked up in front of her and started to pat her down. She squeezed her eyes shut, feeling the invasive hands prodding at places she didn't want him to, but it was quickly over and he was satisfied when he found no evidence of weapons or communication devices.

"You really came here unarmed?" the man said, glaring at her. Kirsten's heart pounded, she didn't notice it before, but his unconcerned sentence flipped the switch, it was the man on her computer who had driven her to the final location.

"You." she said, "Who are you?" she said, following him into the metal building.

"You may only know me as Zac." he said, "I am commander of the Plains Base here, overseeing the majority of the northern bases. It's small, but, as you know, our main bases have been destroyed." He turned and gave her a weak glance.

She knew it, she knew that MECH was established in every corner of the land. Her heart dropped, hoping that it wasn't true. Kirsten looked at the inside of the building. All it was, was a metal warehouse, stocked with barrels and barrels of oil and cables. She wondered what they intended to use it for and build with all of it. There were five men she could see, running communications and other things. Not at all as impressive like the other base she had visited.

"Let me first introduce you to my scenario." Zac started, putting his hands behind his back, "You are familiar with the interactions from the Decepticons and ironically, the only survivor from the West Coast base."

Kirsten didn't say a word to him, letting him explain it all to her first. Hopefully she could find a way to save her parents before anything could transpire.

"I know you never were officially hired by MECH, but, if you cooperate with me on this final job, I will make sure that you never hear from us again and of course, let you leave with a hefty reward." He smiled sinisterly at her.

She felt shivers travel up her spine when he had finished his sentence. "And my parents?" she asked.

"I will delete their location forever." he responded.

Kirsten chose her words carefully, trying negotiate a little more time, "I will tell you anything you want, as long as you guarantee my parents safety, **right now**." she told him seriously and directly, summoning strength from inside her that she didn't know existed.

He seemed to think for a moment, his eyes examining hers while he picked at a hangnail. "Well since we have you here in the flesh...done." He said, and led her to a computer where he displayed her parents location, and the satellite laser that she didn't know was pointed at their house, was completely erased in front of her eyes. She became so angry, but relaxed on the outside. She hoped that it did at least some good.

"Now, for your part." he said, and led her to the other side of the building. They walked toward something the looked very familiar to her. It looked like Soundwave's keyboard and screen but, it was here in MECH's base.

"We retrieved this device from a crashed Decepticon pod quite a long time ago, and we have been working years on end to get it to function." He said, looking very proud of himself.

"And...does it?" Kirsten asked.

He answered her question by turning power on to it via another huge device that looked like a power converter set beside it. She now knew what the barrels of oil were for. The screen came to life and a multitude of signals that were being emitted from the Nemesis were visible, very similar to the tracking signals that Soundwave had shown her on the ship. They were accompanied by symbols.

"Each of these signals are Decepticons in our atmosphere, countless years of work have led us to use their own tracking technology. We have successfully hacked into their signal tracking frequency and can now display here, what they potentially can display on the ship." He turned to face her without hesitation. "You can read these symbols, yes?"

Kirsten's heart dropped into her stomach, she now knew her purpose. "Yes." she said, feeling her throat become dry, reminding herself that she was running out of time.

"All we need from you, is identification." he said slowly.

Kirsten fought hard to keep a placid expression as he said the words that she predicted would come next from his thin mouth.

"Which one...is Soundwave?" he said to her.

* * *

Soundwave lifted a finger off one of his workstation keys, the one that was to activate the long-range cannon toward MECH's Plains Base. He lowered his head, paying very close attention to the frequency he was listening to. 'Which one...is Soundwave?' he replayed to himself, enraged that they would target him alone. Complimentary though it was, to be the most threatening to MECH of all the Decepticons, he still knew that their thirst for their technology would never end, and wouldn't stop at just him. He smirked from behind his mask, the Decepticons had just been directly jeopardized. Continuing to watch and listen, seeing if she would out him or not, he would make a final decision to act as soon as he heard her answer his question even though he had already decided on what to do in his processor.

* * *

Kirsten stared at the screen, knowing in her mind that she needed to talk swiftly, taking too long could mean trouble for her. The moment that the words were spoken from his mouth, she thought about everything, especially the fact that MECH had never been trustworthy and if she survived, she could do everything in her power to stop them with the information that she knew, thanks to Ann. She temporarily zoned out in a split second, just to see something moving in the reflection of the glossy screen behind her. Someone placed something in her bag on the ground while her back was obviously turned. She moved her eyes around the screen to not linger too long on the reflection. That settled it, there was no trusting MECH.

Split second thinking overcame her again, the communication device in her arm, her future as a human, her parent's and others future in danger, the steps she could take to ensure safety among those she trusted. She would risk it all to save everyone, otherwise there would be nothing left. She knew she was about to play a dangerous game, so should she gamble on the hope of a miracle, or assume the honesty of MECH and their questionable word...

She decided to gamble.

"I've made a huge mistake." She seemed to whisper to herself. "I've changed my mind."

"What?" Zac asked, not hearing her correctly.

"I don't know." she said louder for him to hear.

"You lie." Zac said to her and grabbed her by the shoulder, "Show me!" he flung her against the keyboard and pinned her arms behind her back. She screamed in protest and at the unbearable pain that shot through her right arm being bent like that.

A green light suddenly overtook the entire building, a commotion of metal and shots unquestionably fired deafened Kirsten's ears and her attacker was abruptly removed from her body, nearly taking her with him wherever he had gone. Across the room with one swipe. She fell to the ground, getting herself out of harm's way and any stray shots that may head in her direction. She covered her head with her arms, though the tweaking that Zac had given her joints made it more painful to protect herself. A feeling of warmth overcame her, she had gambled correctly and the odds had fallen in her favor as she peeked out from under her arm to see a large, pointed metal foot, the same one that had crushed a soup can right in front of her just months earlier.

Soundwave blasted everything inside of the Plains Base that he could see. It wasn't a big facility so it was over almost as soon as it had began. He crushed the computers and kicked the oil barrels against the wall, and then turned to Kirsten as soon as he knew the job was done. Letting the dust settle for a few moments, he made out her small shape in the far corner of the building, laying in a pile of crushed drywall.

Kirsten noted the pile on top of her, and a familiar fatigue began to overcome her. He had activated the forcefield on her, and she felt the faint sweep of relief and trust growing inside of her when Soundwave removed the biggest piece from atop her, allowing her eyes to settle on his form and make sure that he was really there.

Her bottom lip trembled with anticipation. This was the real thing, the direction of her life, and she embraced it with compassion and feeling as she looked over Soundwave's visor, hoping that he would give her a sign that she was right. She opened her mouth, her voice shaking...

"You heard me...?" she said softly to him, almost unable to believe it herself that he came to her aid by way of her wrist communicator. Her breaths were short and shallow, she physically trembled with the feeling that overtook her. He bent down and rested a hocked leg and a hand against the rubble on the floor. His other hand slowly ventured up towards his face. He moved in fast. He wanted to take this only opportunity while she was still vulnerable to being examined, and with his curiosity mounting, this was the time, or he would never have this moment again.

His hand fixed on his visor and it clicked and grinded. Kirsten bit her lip. With one final grind, the visor detached from its frame, and Soundwave's hand slowly took it, and lowered it down. The light from his optics shone around the frame of his helm, even before he lowered the mask. He had been tormented with the view once, and now he wanted to get a closer look of her with his biological eye. The mask came even lower and exposed his two optics, they were focused on her face. His left optic, glowed slightly dimmer amidst the vertical scars that surrounded it, and circuitry ran along the bottom of it, disappearing into the crevice between his face and helm.

Kirsten looked towards the eyes that he exposed to her, feeling them roam her face and body. The beauty of Soundwave's optics was not just that of the deep glowing red hue they bore, but the power that they harnessed that indirectly locked her eyes with his. She couldn't look away, the millenniums of his life were behind the glowing slitted ovals and the proud scars he wore on his face told of his courage and skills. She knew his story, she knew his journey, and she felt like something hidden that was now unconcealed behind that dark mask extended and grabbed her by the lungs, forcing the air out of her.

The visor lowered slightly more, and revealed both the smooth and scarred half of his mouth.

He took in every bit of information that Kirsten had to offer, the fleshy surface of her skin, the big round blue eyes and the tri-colored hair that faded from a medium-dark auburn-golden to lighter sun-bleached tips at the ends. Her expressions even took on a different form than when his visor detected them, making his spark pulse faster when he could actually notice that the tiny muscles in her forehead contributed to how she looked at him. He documented everything, the way her toes curled in her flip-flops, the small curvature of her back, the size of her breasts, and the way she timidly closed in a shoulder under her chin, he found it all arresting. He noticed it all, so that when she was to become one of them, he could make sure that everything was perfect.

He nodded his head above her once, answering her question as he gazed on her small body.

* * *

When Soundwave had bridged them both back to the Nemesis, he carried her on his winged arm to the main bridge of the ship. Megatron greeted them both with a nod and then got right to the point.

"Kirsten, I will have you know that as a Decepticon, I will not tolerate such unconventional and unstable decision making, do I make myself perfectly clear?" His face sneered towards her, his lip curling back to reveal sharp teeth.

"Yes, Lord Megatron." she said back. "I understand."

The biggest of all journeys wasn't over yet, ensuring the safety of her parents and overseeing the destruction of MECH, but it would all be a lot easier, once she made the transformation, something she should have done from the beginning. Delicately, she took out the flash drive that she had hidden in the pads of her bra and held it in front of both Soundwave and Megatron.

"This, is something you might find useful." she said, extending her arm upwards. Soundwave took the drive in his large fingers and intended to investigate its contents during her conversion. The air became chilly, and she knew it was time. Knock Out walked up beside them, sharpening a razor.

"Shall we start?" he said.

The corridor to Knock Out's bay felt colder than usual, Kirsten rode in silence in Soundwave's careful hands. As they entered Knock Out's room, he set her on the large metal table, another metal table held the prototype. It was a blank, clean silver body, she could almost see the smooth surface move with her gaze.

"Okay, just relax and lay down." Knock Out said to her, Soundwave overseeing next to him. Her eyes darted to Soundwave's visor, looking for a moment of comfort past her jittery nerves. She imagined his optics behind that mask looking at her, telling her that it will all go smoothly.

Easier said than done. She layed on her back, wondering if she would ever get back up. As Kirsten lay on the smooth metal, the wires hanging around her body, ready to be installed, she hoped that it wouldn't be wrong to pray for her safety when she was a Decepticon, wishing for peace in her heart and transparency in her eyes, knowing that there was a good and evil side to all species, but knowing that all anyone wanted, was to survive. This was the only way for the rest of her life to be sustained, otherwise, she would constantly be in immanent danger. There was no turning back now. She glance sideways at the large blank prototype beside her, and she looked it over from the outside, one last time.

"See you in three days." Knock Out smiled and said. He started to administer a different kind of anesthesia than the gas in the wall, and Kirsten fell slowly asleep...


	22. Learning to walk with giants

**A/n: I know last chapter didn't end as suspenseful as I had hoped, I hope that you all forgive me! I just...oh...I just had to throw in some drama ...;) Read on, love yo faces! ~K 3**

Ch 22: Learning to walk with giants

She thought of her existence, but she was numb. She tried to make out the voice in the room, but she couldn't hear. Her body felt heavy and she couldn't move. Her new eyes fluttered, but all she could see was red. Her insides trembled and she routinely went to take a breath of air, but couldn't. She couldn't breathe.

Knock Out leaned over her on the table, running a small light along the junctures of scaled metal. He forced an optic open and shone the light straight in, looking around to see if anything wasn't connected properly. He wasn't sure that all of her nervous system was in tact yet based on her reflexes. But this was the smoothest that the procedure had ever gone since they first started, and it looked like this one was going to be the first true success. Knock Out went across the room to grab another reflex device and that's when she started moving.

She couldn't breath, her eyes immediately opened and she grabbed her throat in reaction, trying to inhale, or exhale, whichever came first. But there were no lungs to contract, and no mechanism to intake air. She rolled over to the side and fell onto the hard floor, still clutching at her throat.

Knock Out immediately ran to her and kneeled down at her body. Picking her head up, he cradled her shoulders in his arms, "Relax! Relax!" he said to her, grabbing her hand and pried it from her neck, "Don't try to breathe, you can't breathe, there's no more breathing!" he said to her, trying to comfort her the only way he knew how, he rocked her mechanically in his grasp. Kirsten's optics were focused on the ceiling but then they quickly moved to Knock Out's face, she could see his blurry face shape and helm shape and light and dark.

The inability to breathe had her in a panic, so she listened to his words with caution and began to relax, hard though it was. Squeezing her optics shut and tensing her facial structure, she imagined holding her breath, it was weird, but it was okay.

"There you go..." Knock Out said softly to her, he marveled at how well the living metal conformed to copy her body and face, the first female to undergo the procedure. Her lips were fuller than those of a normal Cybertronian's and the absence of a nose didn't seem to mess up the proportion ratios on her face. Kirsten eventually felt exhausted and passed out again, she at least in the corner of her mind, knew that she was alive.

Knock Out rubbed her face gently and his mouth curled upward. The solid, but pliable metal that was her face relaxed in front of him as she fell offline, her head falling towards his chest. He stayed still on the floor with her for a while and then picked her up to set her back on the table. As he was doing that, Soundwave appeared at the doorway. Knock Out glanced his way but swiftly went back to what he was doing, which was checking out all her connections.

"So far so good..." he said, "She came to, and then she went offline, they always want to breathe." Knock Out said, shaking his head as he prodded at her fingers with an electric device.

Soundwave had watched only bits and pieces of the transformation, every time he would return to Knock Out's room, a little more of the metal had changed its shape in her likeness. He was extremely satisfied with the results. The plates on her arms and legs took the shape of the organic muscle tissue in her body and even the curvature of her full bottom lip could be compared to the original. Just another multi-cell organism given the gift of life...

It had been exactly three days from the beginning to the end of the process and Knock Out had been working feverishly on her all three of those days, he was ready to take a break, and Soundwave was content to take over for the last few hours while Knock Out recharged. He feathered his hidden optics across the metal form of her new body when Knock Out stepped out of the room.

The striking likeness was indisputable. He was satisfied to know that the project had gone very smoothly, and waited. He stood over her, examining her processing activity and energon circulation. She might even be walking by the day's end. He felt like he had done the right thing, which was to look after her safety because in order to start over with the entire process, time and resources would have been wasted. Had she have outed him to MECH, he wouldn't have made the same choice, so while it would have been easier to just kill them all at once, including her, something about the situation had called for deeper reasoning.

She had put her own life in danger when she turned face against MECH, she didn't have to do that. But she did. Why did she do that? Soundwave pondered and processed, so much so that it made him dizzy. There wasn't anything practical about it. She had made a choice based upon suppositions, not fact. And, was it trust? Did she really have that much trust to change her mind so suddenly and gamble on him? Either way, the results were favorable. A few more hours passed in silence until Knock Out came back into the room from his recharge.

...

"Okay, it's time for her to get up and start moving." Knock Out said, stretching his limbs. Soundwave stepped back so that the doctor could work. He started prodding at Kirsten's metal form with an electric current, checking reflexes. Kirsten stirred and woke up from the odd sensations.

"Rememeber, relax, don't breathe, you don't need to breathe." Knock Out reminded her, talking more softly and gently than he normally did.

Kirsten, with her optics squinted shut, nodded her head from on the table. She fought the instinct to take a breath even though the memory in her body chemistry told her to do it, it was a hard habit to break. She opened her eyes.

She tried to feel the body out while Knock Out examined all of her appendages, down to the last little knuckle. She tried rotating her head to the sides, it was a lot harder than she would have ever thought.

"Your new body has mimicked your organic muscle tissue, but remember that it's not muscle, it's energon pneumatics and hydraulics. Pressurized liquids. Activate it, don't strain it." Knock out said to her, and she tried to understand what he meant.

A tramsmission from Megatron appeared on Knock Out's operating screen. "Soundwave, Knock Out, report to the bridge immediately."

Both of them nodded and Knock Out secured the room for his departure. "Don't get up, but try to move your fingers, hopefully Lord Megatron won't take too long." he said to Kirsten as he grabbed his staff. And then they left together.

Kirsten tried moving her fingers and toes. She didn't even know if she had toes, none of the others did. She moved each finger on both hands one by one, picking them up and tapping them against the hard metal surface. She then tried to move her whole arm. She lifted them one by one successfully but only because she could shift her weight, getting them to move together proved more challenging. She wondered what else on her body was the same, and what was different.

With her left hand, she began to fold it and touched her face. It was alarming not to find the sensual protrusion of a nose in between her eyes, and she found an interesting sensation in touching herself. It wasn't like a normal skin to skin sensation, but more of an electro-magnetic sense that she had now that she was made of metal. Intriguing indeed, she thought. Working her hand down, she felt the scaly surface breaks of her body joints, her neck, her shoulders, but her breasts were smooth. She had no nipples, and her abs were plated and thankfully, no room for fat to collect. On the downside, no foods to be ingested either.

While she was alone, she had a rousing curiosity as she worked her hand down. Did the metal copy everything?... She thinned her red optics in thought but then worked her hand into the crevice between her legs.

'Holy Shit' she thought. Yes. It copied everything, down to the sensitive softer metal found between her legs. She was partially terrified and partially excited wondering how that was all going to work. She lifted and then dropped her head back on the table, the clang of the sound surprisingly not echoing in her head. She felt a funny giddy feeling overcome her and she squeezed her optics shut as a smile crept over her face. This might be more fun than she originally thought.

thought that, maybe she was ready for a change, ready for something new, and this something new had hit her like a ton of bricks. She liked it more and more, now that there was no turning back to the way her life once was, surfing was out of the question, no more contacts with friends, and her college degree meant shit. Actually come to think of it, it was probably the ultimate job to get from her college studies. She snickered. And then she thought about Soundwave.

Soundwave was, different. She didn't think she would ever experience this strange feeling in the pit of her stomach when he was near her, when he touched her, or when she looked at him. But he made it so.

He meant the world to her. She didn't know if he knew it, but she thought about him more often than anyone else. She felt protected by him, and, wasn't that what all girls wanted from a man? He had it all. Intelligence, determination, power, discipline, harbor, danger. She would be lieing to herself if she didn't also admit to finding him quite attractive, in an unconventional way. She thought about what kind of advances he would make now, and what it would be like. However interesting that the thought was to her, she wiped her mind clean quickly and focused on learning her new body as the door to the room opened again.

...

Knock Out had gotten her to sit up on the table, she was as big as him now, maybe a little smaller. Seeing him from this angle was so new to her, she couldn't help but be amazed at how things changed when she saw things from a different perspective. She had to admit, as he worked around her, She began to feel more comfortable now that she wasn't so small in comparison. His face was smooth and polished, not scratched like Soundwave's or Megatron's. He really took care of his looks, which made him less rough looking, he definitely had that going for him.

"Okay, tell me what you see." Knock Out said holding up three fingers.

Kirsten opened her mouth and said, or thought she said three, but, nothing came out. She tried again. She frowned, confused at why she couldn't use her voice. Her mouth was forming the words fine but where was the sound?

"Again with the breath, you have a vocalizer, not vocal chords. Try it again but imagine the vibration coming from your energy and not your breath." He leaned into her to see if he could hear anything, trying not to notice the perfectly copied humps of her breasts.

"Eee..." Kirsten said, trying as hard as she could to harmonize the vibrations in her throat, but it sounded as good as a baby goat. "Reee.." she tried again. The more attempts she gave it, the better it sounded.

"That's it." Knock Out said and smiled mildly, "Practice makes perfect." He couldn't deny the feeling he got being so near her. It was a warm feeling having a femme of her size around again. He never liked the company of Airachnid, she was harsh and cruel. Kirsten had a reborn innocence.

Knock Out stood back, wondering if Soundwave would mind if he approached her as a gentleman sometime, starting over from the beginning. He'd make himself a gentleman right now, he decided, that way, he wouldn't have Soundwave on his ass. He knew that Soundwave was fond of her, even if he never would admit it in front of him, but he knew. He could tell by the way he looked after her. So, Knock Out decided to turn a blind eye and try his luck, pretending that he knew nothing of the feelings that Soundwave and Kirsten had exchanged.

"Try this." Knock Out said, "Repeat me, aah."

Kirsten tried the vowel, "Hhhh" she tried, again missing the vocalization.

"Again." Knock Out said. "Ahh Ohh"

They repeated these exercises for a while until she could consistently vocalize.

"Good, let's try standing now." Knock Out said.

'Psh, standing.' Kirsten thought, she could do that. She shifted her weight onto her toe-like protrusions and pushed herself up from the table. She stood, but didn't stay long as she fell forward, crashing into Knock Out's chest. Knock Out grabbed her under her arms and stumbled backwards as he caught her.

He chuckled mockingly. "Getting ahead of yourself now?" Kirsten nodded against his chest, not knowing what went wrong. "Your balance has shifted, come on, up now.." He hauled her upwards onto her feet again and steadied her with his massive hands against her curved hips. She rocked back and forth, trying to find the right position where she could feel equilibrium. Knock Out's hands clasped against her smaller hips, feeling the smooth juncture of her plating inwards towards her abdomen. Smoother than a normal Cybertronian femme, probably because of the body that was copied, he noted the way her hips tilted slightly to the sides to find balance.

Kirsten was exhausted, this was too hard. She grabbed onto Knock Out's massive arms to stabilize herself after she had found the right balance but then began to lose it again. She hoped he didn't get the wrong idea, but then, it wouldn't be entirely surprising if he did. She started to become giddy with excitement, learning to control a new body, who would've thought. She started to laugh without sound.

"Hey now." Knock Out said and tried to hold her up as she fell downwards from weakness. He heaved her up against his large chest and she said something he couldn't quite make out.

"M ade fu etl." She said, her voice not quite catching everything that her mouth was forming. What she meant to say was, 'I'm made of metal.' she had reached an entirely humorous state of disbelief.

"Come on, walk." Knock Out said to her, trying to be serious although very amused at her laughing at herself. He pulled her forward by her hips, she held onto his arms and she was dragged. She wondered why she couldn't lift up her foot.

"Hydraulics work very differently than muscles, tension and pressure, not flexing." Knock Out told her. Kirsten was shakey from trying not to burst out laughing again at the absurdity of learning to walk, so she nodded her head with her mouth clamped shut and took a step.

* * *

"Amazing..." Megetron said as he read through the information again after Soundwave transferred it to the ship's database. He and Soundwave were going through the information gathered by Ann that Kirsten had given them. "I feel the success of blackmail." he curled an evil smile from the side of his lips. "Go check on her Soundwave, make sure she is progressing on time. Knock Out should know better than to waste time fawning at the very least."

Soundwave nodded quickly and exited the bridge. He was antsy to go back and see her. While Megatron thought that Knock Out knew better, Soundwave did not think so. But he couldn't just leave Megatron's side for a long period of time as he needed to perform work. He shuffled swiftly towards Knock Out's operating room, anxious to see the progress, and to see her. His abdomen sizzled with heat as the more he thought about her alone with Knock Out, the more Knock Out had time to have his way, and Soundwave would never know. He approached the final corridor and his optics burned through his visor as he turned the last corner and stopped in his tracks at what he saw. His anxiousness dropped like a cold stone to distress.

With his back to Soundwave, Knock Out was gracefully holding Kirsten's hands, walking her forward, step by step. Kirsten was smiling. Why was she smiling?

Soundwave shifted his weight and took one more step forward, louder than normal. Kirsten's head popped up from focusing on the floor and her feet and she saw Soundwave standing behind Knock Out. Her smile widened as she laid her eyes on his form and took another step. Unfortunately, that step wasn't as planned and she tripped forward from losing focus into Knock Out's arms again.

"so-wae" she tried to say Soundwave's name as she started laughing, embarrassed that she tripped right in front of him. Soundwave, focusing on the pink flush growing on her cheeks, glad that that feature had transferred, felt like reaching forward and bringing her to her feet again but Knock Out was there first. Kirsten laughed hard into Knock Out's chest, hiding her face from her very embarrassing spill, and she was doing so good before that. Knock Out started laughing with her, patting her back and holding her closer. His eyes turned to meet Soundwave's gaze and he dipped his head low, smiling to Soundwave in a conquering, mischevious glare.

Knock Out made sure that Soundwave saw them, sending him the glance that told him 'I am challenging you.' Soundwave witnessed them laughing at and to each other, wondering where this sudden air of comfort between them had come from. Usually Kirsten wasn't amiable with Knock Out.

Soundwave vented. He didn't know what to think, he tucked his head into his shoulders and stood quietly, thinking that Kirsten would have tried to reach for him instead. She was getting in the way of his work again. The fact that she had secured herself a place in his spark had become a real nuisance. But he hadn't realized it until the tweak of jealousy had crashed down upon him, squishing him helpless against Knock Out's exquisite charm.

He had known there was something there. Something comforting and fulfilling when she was with him. How could he have been so ignorant. He wanted her, only her because she was, who she was. Long past a working partner, he had grown attached to her as a companion. He had come to expect her sunny gaze when he walked into his workroom. He had come to expect her calm presence when he was stressed. Most of all though, he had come to expect her to work by his side with him, not beside him. 'FUCK' Soundwave thought, and he hadn't made sure to secure himself in her spark, even after their explorations, even after the rescue, even after he displayed to her the most sensitive part of his body, his face, and now she was gripping onto Knock Out's arms as if he was her savior.

And Knock Out's smug smile had sent him into a spinning tornado of anguish. Soundwave turned angrily around and began a quick walk back to the bridge without a sound. Knock Out watched him walk away, sneering in success.

"Let's continue, hmm?" He said softly about Kirsten, brushing his mouth delicately and undetectably over her head.


	23. Little of this, little of that

**A/N: Aww thanks readers for being SOOOOO fantastic! I know, Knock Out's a little fucker. A little drama here, a little jealousy there, YUM. I am glad that the last chapter sat well in your tum-tums! This chapter involves a little bit of everything, a little bit of learning, a little bit of Soundwave, a little bit of Knock Out, and of course, a little bit of suggestive indecencies. The story must go on! Until I end it! Gotta be honest with you, I am trying to tie up a few loose ends (like the parent thing) so that I can focus on the Kirsten/Soundwave relationship so if this chapter seems like filler, it's only because I am a completionist! That's not a word. You get the idea. Oh-and for you who worried about it becoming a Knock Out/Kirsten fic...OoOoh you worry too much ;) Should you? I dunno, should I? IUNO...will it? READ ON lovers! I love your faces and I'm just in LOOOVE with your reviews! *blush*. Yay ^_^**

**Oh-does anyone need me to explain the timeline? In short..I started writing this in the middle of Season 2 so assuming things stayed the same, it's like *spoiler* (you know Starscream is a rebel, Dreadwing is still alive...) just in the near future where I have made up that the humans know of the Autobots and the Decepticons now. Is that AU? I don't know..I don't read enough fics to know. Okay enough of me. Again, love your beautiful faces! ;) ~K**

Ch 23: Little of this, little of that

Kirsten got better with every hallway she went down. Walking along the wall without Knock Out's help, learning to find her own balance and lift her own legs. Dragging her hands across the lighted walls, one step after another, slowly but surely she made her way to the gateway room where her and Soundwave had spent so much time together. She poked her head around the corner of the entrance and looked for the big grey and indigo mech. He wasn't in there.

Disappointed, she turned around and followed the wall to the bridge. Knock Out's voice came from behind her.

"I leave you alone for one nanosecond and you're wandering the halls alone like that!" Knock Out rushed up behind her and turned her around to face him.

"What do you mean, 'like that'?" Kirsten asked him.

"I need to install your armor." He said, pushing her back towards his room.

"You mean I'm naked!?" Kirsten gasped out, the vibrations of her voice wavering in and out, but for the most part, she was articulating her words.

Knock Out snickered, "What? No. There's no such thing as naked, but you do need protection, especially in places it counts." Knock Out stopped walking and faced her. "Like here." He lifted his hands up and placed them on his shoulders. "Here." He placed his hand on his head. "Here, here, here." He touched his arms, legs and lower legs. "And here.." then he moved both hands to either side of his groin region.

"So...everywhere." Kirsten stated.

"Let's see what we can design." Knock Out said proudly and placed his hand on her shoulder, leading her back to the operating room.

Kirsten had noticed the different tonality of Knock Out's voice and actions towards her. She accredited it to the fact that she wasn't a human anymore, but more like one of them. She was on his level and seemed like she was getting a lot more respect for it.

When they returned to his room, he dug through a pile of pre-fabricated pieces of armor, unpainted and unused. He chose appropriate sized pieces for the locations that he had pointed out.

"I think these will be fine." Knock Out said, putting the pieces aside to attach.

Kirsten looked at the raw pieces of metallic armor, not seeing the design he was looking for. "I- um, okay..."

"Relax, simple procedure, I'll make it look good." he winked towards her. "And if you don't like it, I can always change it." He flipped a welding torch in his hand.

Kirsten shrugged, if anyone were to design her armor, she'd rather it be him since he obviously knew what he was doing based on his own decadent style. He started on her legs, but it wasn't there that she started feeling sensations as we welded her. Kirsten felt something itchy in her back, reaching back there she tried to scratch it but found two protrusions.

"What the hell?" she said out loud.

Knock Out looked up from her legs, noticing what she was reaching at. "Those are your wings." he said, "They're coming out." he returned to his work, "They should be fully developed in about three weeks."

"You didn't tell me that I wasn't finished." Kirsten said, "What else do I have to look forward to?"

"Learning to transform, learning to fight, learning about weapons, defense. Recharge, fixing yourself, flying, detaching parts, cable guides, hydraulic leaks, energon consumption," He counted on his fingers.

"Again...everything." Kirsten said to him.

"There's some thing you can teach me about your body too, since you're kind of a hybrid, The body only provided a plate for growth. Tell me about some things I am not too familiar with, like the metal that grew out from your finger tips, you don't need those right?"

Kirsten assumed he was referring to her nails. The body had copied that aspect, but wasn't needed. "I guess not."

"And these small protrusions on your feet, I can get rid of those. I have something better, I can fix and replace anything on you." Knock Out said, sanding the plate he just attached to her leg.

"Whatever you think is necessary." Kirsten said, letting the doctor do his work, "Why doesn't that hurt?" She poked her head forward, referring to the welds on her legs.

"These? It's because your pain sensors aren't this close to the surface of your body, unlike your wimpy human skin. Think of the practicality of it." Knock Out said while working on the other leg. He worked with speed and confidence, as if he'd done this for many, many years. "Do you have a color preference?" he asked.

Kirseten didn't really. She liked all colors. She had a small idea though, one of her favorite surfboards was white with pink, teal, and orange accents. She cracked a smile at the thought.

"What can you do with pink, teal and orange?" Kirsten asked him with a smile.

"Anything." He replied, returning the smile.

* * *

Megatron was contented with the new files that he could use against the governments, the people of MECH and others on earth to threaten them with their presence. The bounty of Kirsten's time away from the ship had actually proved to be useful. Soundwave came up behind him and Megatron softly grunted, "Report on our new member." He had just returned from checking on Kirsten's progress and tending on gathering information for their next plan of action to find more Cybertronian relics. His mood wasn't good, and the tasks proved to be mundane.

Soundwave did nothing, he only nodded his head, which Megatron didn't see. Never had he felt so wretched, not lately at least. It was a feeling that he wasn't used to. Perhaps he'd felt this way before, a long time ago, but then again, he had been feeling a lot of things lately that he had long since forgotten the memory of.

"Soundwave, report on the girl!" He turned to face the spy. Soundwave still didn't move.

"Didn't you log anything Soundwave? It's unlike you to refute my question." Megatron said to him. His top commanding spy again, neglected the question with more silence.

"Soundwave, your silence is making me question your stability." Megatron said directly. "**What** is it?"

Soundwave retreated from his inner thoughts and suddenly fell to his knees in front of Megatron, asking for forgiveness in his deep bow for his lack of information, and then stood up again. Soundwave finally displayed Kirsten's vitals remotely, more sloppy than usual but he had to.

Megatron made a circle around Soundwave before he spoke to him, noticing the way he was standing, the way he hung his arms and the hot venting he exhausted.

"I remember that this was all your idea, Soundwave." he said in a deep, rough voice, "There is only one thing that I can speculate that put you in this kind of mood."

Soundwave listened to him, assuming that he would get reprimanded for letting her get in the way of his own work for the Decepticons. Megatron came full circle and faced him again, his face dangerously close to his.

He whispered into Soundwave's audio receptors, "You have competition, no less."

Soundwave listened without moving, interested to see how much his master could see through him.

"That was to be expected, wasn't it?" Megatron whispered again, "The thoughts even ran across my processor at some point." Megatron stepped back from him and glared down at Soundwave, the only Decepticon that he would ever allow leniency on the ship, save Starscream who had since abandoned him. Megatron continued, "I once remember a great and popular warrior with the skill of a god, and anything he touched, was his. He who would take any chance to throw mercy aside for the sake of a kill, with no remorse. A warrior who took his disadvantages and turned them into his strengths." He started to chuckle deeply, Megatron spoke of him. "Ironic how the smallest parasite can slowly eat away at the insides of a great entity to bring it to its destruction."

Soundwave processed his words. It was true, he was a ruthless warrior, a great gladiator alongside Megatron. But that was the past, Megatron knew that there was less to fight for now than back then.

"But not for you..." Megatron said, as if he could read Soundwave's mind. Megatron relinquished his story-telling voice to become deeper and more serious. "Not for you...because you won't allow it, will you? I need my top intelligence officer at full capacity, and right now, I am getting half." He dipped his head to the side, leaning ominously over Soundwave's head, and bared his teeth. "What are you going to do about that, Soundwave?"

Soundwave had had enough of Megatron's advice, even though he was right. He turned from Megatron's towering gaze and slowly walked away from him, wanting to calculate his thoughts and the facts to figure it out himself. That was before a surprising blast came from behind him and Soundwave had to spin immediately to block the blast with his strong, bladed arm that Megatron had fired. Megatron started laughing, placing his hands regally on his hips.

"You have forgotten so many facets of fighting in the ring, Soundwave..."Megatron lowered his head dramatically and raised his arm again, ready to fire another shot. "You don't fight by blocking."

Megatron fired his arm cannon at Soundwave again, this time Soundwave blocked the shot and then fired back with his own cannons, causing Megatron to duck away from the shots and block himself. Both of them crouched on the floor of the bridge facing each other in defensive stances. Megatron cracked a sinister smile, "You block... and then counter."

* * *

Megatron had called Kirsten to the bridge after Knock Out had finished her paint and polish, it was time for him to brief her on her continued duties.

Kirsten followed Knock Out into the bridge of the ship, Megatron, Soundwave and Dreadwing were waiting beside him. Knock Out stepped aside and left Kirsten alone in front of the giant, silver mech.

They all looked her over, having a new face to get used to was going to prove difficult for some, and easier for others. Dreadwing, being indifferent about the whole thing looked on her as a foreigner, it would take a lot of continued experience for her to convince him of her usefulness since she wasn't a fighter.

Soundwave of course, knew her usefulness, and he had let Megatron know of his ideas, all of which Megatron agreed to and compromised with.

"Kirsten, while our party is small, it will be a short inaguration," Megatron said to her. "Kneel."

Kirsten kneeled in front of him, making her half the height of what she was, and standing she was still only as tall as Megatron's waist. The pulsing spark inside of her body now that had taken the place of her heart felt like it was going to explode with the uncertain future ahead. Her silver body reflected the red lights from inside of the ship, and her colored accents glowed dimmer shades of their respective colors, as if the ship was blanketing her from being seen in her true nature.

"Will you pledge allegiance to me, and to the Decepticons?" Megatron said, hovering his large hand over her head.

"Yes." she said.

"Will you be true to the Decepticon cause?"

"Yes."

"Are you willing to give your life for the Decepticon cause and serve only those who have also sworn themselves to me?"

She hesitated briefly, but didn't want to know what would happen if she said no, "Yes." she said.

"Arise Kirsten, human liaison, Ambassador to Earth." Megatron placed his hand on her small shoulder and she stood.

'Ambassador to Earth?' she thought. A fitting title.

"It will be your duty to act as communication liaison with our indigenous earthly inhabitants. You have shown proactive measures for negotiation and I think this will benefit us to have one of their own interacting with them so that we may not inherit problems that slow down our progress." Megatron said and then held out a silver emblem of the Decepticon insignia.

Knock Out took the insignia from Megatron and quickly and seamlessly attached it to her left shoulder with a small laser on his arm.

"Welcome, to the Decepticons." Megatron said and he nodded his head down at her.

She dipped her head back and said, "Thank you, Lord Megatron."

* * *

Kirsten reached behind her to scratch her back as she went from station to station. Knock Out had tried to explain to her that wings always developed afterwards, to shape perfectly and uniquely to perfectly align with the stability, balance, and transformation of the unique body's innerworkings. She did notice her balance was off from the development over time, but it was gradual.

For the remainder of the day, she learned from the drones, which stations were those that tracked energon deposits and what needed to be done in order for them to collect the energon. Since the earth was wise to the Decepticon's needs, the humans had started building bases near them. Her job now was to ensure that the humans didn't interfere with the energon collections by negotiating with the land owners, because otherwise what would happen is that the country's military would start arriving in forces, watching them, tracking them any which way they could, and possibly get the Autobots involved. She was to still answer to Soundwave, but more so Megatron, which to her meant the same as a promotion, nice.

She had a pending job to learn, as one of their energon mining sites had been compromised based on the interaction from the government. The job was to **not** piss off the government because they usually sided with the Autobots, who, in broken numbers, had befriended most of the humans in their favor. Since she couldn't fly yet to start her duty, she tried to learn all she could about the Decepticon history, the way energon worked, the way things just...worked.

Soundwave, feeling like he hadn't had a chance to meet with her fully since a day ago when he had witnessed her and Knock Out in the corridor, was on his way to another station when he saw her having trouble searching in the database.

"Come on..." she vocalized softly. She was trying to type in the symbols necessary to search for information on logged government interactions. She didn't have one or maybe two symbols right and it unfortunately wasn't like google which tried to correct her misspellings for her.

Soundwave immediately knew which two symbols were wrong as he read her screen from a distance. What other perfect time was there to 'counter' his opponent while she was alone. Although Knock Out could be thanked for the detailed handywork on her armor, the fact still remained that it was a direct copy of her old body, which he had grown quite fond of over time, in his size. In order to reaffirm his power over her, he started walking in her direction and began to rekindle those feelings that she'd left him hungry for.

Kirsten, flustered at the screen, wondering what symbols she was misusing, felt a sudden heat behind her and then pressure on her lower back below where the wings were growing. Two long, bladed arms with indigo stripes came forward from the sides of her shoulders and reached forward to the keyboard in front.

Kirsten started to feel her body warm up. Soundwave. She was wondering when he would come around. Her pulse heightened and her body tingled with new feelings of electrical tings and kinks. His arms had encircled her and trapped against him and the computer's keyboard. Slowly, he began to change the two symbols that she had wrong to the correct ones, and then the information that she wanted, opened in front of her.

Kirsten wasn't paying attention to what symbols were changed, she was only focused on Soundwave. It was like butterflies in the stomach, but different, she felt like a pure and recently popped bottle of champagne. Soundwave wasn't going to stop there, he needed to give her a reason. Pushing his hips forward, he met her right leg with his larger one and spooned it, allowing her to feel his body from behind her and the heat that it was giving off.

She could feel him, not like the same as skin to skin contact, but sensual, magnetic, an energy stream-like conductivity. Her upper leg and shapely bottom were being inconspicuously kneaded by Soundwave's long leg. She was still a good three heads shorter than he was, a good average size for a femme. He dipped his head low and with the sharp edge of the sensors that graced the corners of his chin, just slid them lightly across her un-armored neck, just around the side.

Kirsten trembled, the light touching, the conductive senses, she turned her head to the side where Soundwave's head was and she slowly turned her entire tingly body around to face him, regretfully making his leg retreat from hers. She leaned back on the keyboard, as he also took a step backwards, so that they could face each other for the first time, just the two of them. Her optics came even with his chest, a great advancement from her older human stature which had been considerably shorter than his lower knee joint, but it was a familiar place to be considering that the platform she had worked on was the same height that she was now.

She didn't know whether to respond or not. She felt embarrassed returning such provocatively intended gestures. It was suddenly different now, their odd relationship. It was different in the fact that it could actually work. Before, there was no chance of that happening and that's what scared her for a moment. Before, she could have an excuse, she could have bowed out for obvious reasons, they were completely different species of different sizes. But now there was no excuse to dismiss the way she had become to feel towards Soundwave.

She noticed her reflection in his visor as she pondered. There were two red slitted ovals staring back at her, and a face that she didn't recognize that mimicked her facial expressions. She opened her mouth to gasp, but no gasp came, and then she started touching her face all over, just to make sure that the reflection was her own.

Soundwave let her marvel at her new body in himself. As good as he was at concealing his emotions, she had definitely made it hard for him over time, but then, that was normal. He barely remembered the last femme he was ever with, a long time ago, just before Megatron took him as a lieutenant of the Decepticons. He couldn't keep her around, he didn't want the long-term advantages of the companionship from her. He didn't understand why back then, but now, he did. When everything had been lost, and out of the shambles came a second chance to do it right and re-think the bounties, he would be a fool to let it go.

"Soundwave," her voice feathered across his audio receptors, she spoke with intent and concern. He watched her eyes re-focus to look at him instead of herself."Will you still help me, with being here?" She looked straight into where his optics would be behind the mask, "Like before? Before I was, this?"

Soundwave displayed her tracking beacon on his visor, indicating that he would know where she was if needed. He then displayed the multitude of Cybertronian symbols for their language and brought one of his long arms to his chest, pointing to himself, indicating that if she needed assistance with language, he would oblige. He nodded to her like always. He displayed the earth, measurements of distance and the basics of wings, flight thrusters and rudder movement. He would teach her to fly. He nodded again. He would help her with anything she wanted as long as it didn't interfere with his work or her work. But then, he thought, helping her become a better Cybertronian would be efficient for the entire Decepticon cause. Again, he justified another decision just to spend more time with her.

When he nodded, a type of smile grew on Kirsten's face that he'd never seen before. It was meek and shy, and grateful, and it partnered with her intense powerful optics which strengthened her appearance. He wanted to take her right then and there. Who cared if the drones watched, it would just make it all the more interesting. He was a fighter, not a passive spectator and he needed to make sure that the idea was constantly reinforced in Kirsten's processor without being blatantly obvious. He couldn't wait to someday dig his hands into those wings of hers and pull them sharply against him.

"What... do you think?" Kirsten asked, rubbing her arms and looking down at her body, examining the plates and ridges and armor. "Is it up to standards?" she continued, not knowing whether she was really implying if her body was up to Cybertronian standards, or his own. Maybe both.

Oh, if she only knew what he was thinking, Soundwave mused behind his visor. He simply gave his standard nod and displayed a graph of survivability with her new body versus her old one.

"Yes, stronger is definitely better." She agreed and chuckled, "And Knock Out spent hours putting the finishing touches together." She smiled at the thought, glad that his mood had changed for the better.

Soundwave, careful to tread around Knock Out at the moment, remained still to the mention of his name.

"Also..." Kirsten asked hesitantly, "What about contacting my parents? And Ann...the one who gathered the blackmailing information?" She twisted her fingers together in a grasp and picked at the nails that didn't exist, a habit to break eventually.

Soundwave moved forward to the computer that Kirsten leaned on, and he started working. Kirsten watched him work fast, locating her parent's address quickly in the system from MECH's records. He then worked to locate the beach house on a diagram of the map they had and zoomed in on its location.

Only looking at a red dot on a purple screen, Kirsten wondered what Soundwave was going to do. Certainly she couldn't ground bridge there as easily as she thought she could, otherwise he would have done that for her by now. His chest moved and Laserbeak detached herself from his front and began a flight outward from the ship. Kirsten watched the bird fly out of sight and then looked to Soundwave for answers. He brought Laserbeak's video signal up on screen and soon Kirsten was watching the bird's own path towards the west coast.

"To check if it's safe?" Kirsten asked Soundwave from beside him.

Soundwave looked down at her and displayed MECH's many documented movements near Los Angeles, where her parents resided just north of, close to the shore. Not meaning that they had a base, but where he had caught an agent he had tagged once before. Kirsten nodded back to Soundwave, understanding the concern before she were to randomly show up on their doorstep. She didn't know how long it would take, from the looks of Laserbeak's video transmission, they were above forest, maybe over Washington, or maybe over Vermont. She would need to find a safe place for them since MECH was persistent.

"Can you show me a bigger picture of MECH's logged locations?" Kirsten asked him. Soundwave turned to the keyboard again and this time tapped his finger, which before had meant to pay attention. She didn't expect it meant any different now. He showed her how to type in the search codes and the coordinates of the searched data. It was quickly up on screen. She reached forward, wanting to get a better view of the Americas. 'Hmm.' she thought. Not much activity was documented in Central America.

Soundwave received a transmission from the loading bay. He dismissed himself from Kirsten's side, leaving her to watch Laserbeak's journey and documented information on the screen.

She watched for an hour, searching the map and then returning to the video feed. She kind of had a plan but not really, it all depended on what Laserbeak's find would return. She was getting closer though. Kirsten watched her fly over the mountainous region just beyond the city and then turn north, heading northwest. She flew at such tremendous speed, faster than a jet and very agile. Soon, she could make out her parent's house, the small white wooden structure not far from the ocean with the brown wooden porch. Laserbeak circled the house once and came back around again to the front and seemed to hover.

Kirsten was surprised to see her parents standing at the front door entrance, talking with a man dressed in black. The man had his hands in his pockets and her parents looked as if they were sad, her father holding her mother's shoulder as if to comfort her. Her father shook his head after the man seemed to ask him a question. Her mother chewed on her fingernails, a bad habit that she too had picked up.

Kirsten loved seeing their faces again, missing them so much. They were probably talking about her, he was probably a police agent asking for information because they had reported her missing. Of course, that would explain it. But her thoughts were soon disproved as the man in black pulled a gun from his pocket and aimed it straight at her mom...


	24. Unintended situations

**A/N: AAAAH breathe... breathe. I hit a block earlier...but I think it's gone:) Thank goodness, I know where I'm going with this now! Thanks for all of the great reviews, favs, you guys are awesome...I appreciate each and every one of them, really:) Oi...LOVE YO FACES! *heart* ~K**

CH 24: Unintended situations

"No.." she whisper-yelled, jumping suddenly to her senses. It was MECH, questioning them about her. Those fuckers. She ground her metal teeth together and suddenly felt the surge of panic overcome her. She had to do something **now**. What was she supposed to do? Her eyes darted around the screen as if some kind of answer would be there for her. She could see her dad hold a hand up in surrender as his other arm closed in closely around her mom. The man walked forward and prodded them threateningly with his gun into the house. She couldn't see them anymore.

"Damnit MECH!" she said and pounded her fists against the screen. She worked, trying to find the way to open the ground bridge, Soundwave wasn't near, Knock Out wasn't either. Would the drones listen to her? She jogged to the nearest drone. "Can you open a ground bridge?" She asked feverishly. But he ignored her. She ran to the next one that was walking past, "Can you open a ground bridge!?" but he kept walking. They probably only answered to Megatron. She had to find Soundwave, he would listen. As she turned to head towards a hallway, she tripped over her clumsy, heavy feet and fell.

No one helped her up, the drones were almost mindless, carrying on about their duties. Moving too fast for her body to keep up, she thought, and she pushed herself away from the floor getting to her knees. Her gaze was blocked by a silver mech walking towards her, and he stood as she tried to get herself up from the hard ground.

"I hear that you're making quite a commotion in here." Megatron said to her, his eyes bearing down on her like fire. He snarled. "Why?"

Kirsten couldn't imagine asking Megatron directly for permission to leave the ship so soon after being sworn in. But she had to try, right? Her concerned gaze shifted from his optics to the screen and back again several times. "L-Lord M-Megatron, with your permission, may I uh..." She stood up in front of him, stuttering.

"May you what? Rescue your parents before they get destroyed?" Megatron growled at her, "I've been watching you, I know what you want. If I open a ground bridge for you, you must make sure and make it worth my while. Destroy the MECH agent. No mercy. Send them a message." He was going to test her on her promises she had made to him.

"Open a ground bridge for our ambassador at these coordinates." Megatron told the drone sitting next to the screen. He obliged and a green light immediately shone a few seconds after he requested.

Megatron stood with his hands crossed, ready to witness her abilities on Laserbeak's video transmission. She had no weapons, no defense, and no plan. But she had willpower, and she mustered all the courage she could find when she entered the green light.

* * *

"I told you, we want no part in this!" Jake, Kirsten's dad yelled at the man.

"It's not an issue if you want to or not, I'm going to make you." the MECH agent said to him as he pointed the gun at Kirsten's mom, Erin.

"But why?! We don't know where Kirsten is, YOU don't know where she is, are you just going to hold us until she shows up!?" Erin said, getting on the floor with her hands on her head, Jake doing the same.

Before the man had entered their house, he had flashed his police badge at them. It was real, so lawfully, they had to abide.

"It was the government who took her, so it should be you who has her." Jake said, grunting as the man forced him to the floor with the gun pointed to his head.

"**SHUT UP**!" the man said and lifted a hand to his ear and spoke into the earpiece, "M-019, I have them on the floor, bring the truck around."

"What if she's dead?!" Erin gasped to her husband while his head was forced against the hardwood floor, his shaggy blonde hair dripping with sweat in his face. Jake looked at her with concerned eyes, she was their only child. His tanned, leathery skin amongst his blue eyes glittered with moisture while the gun jabbed and prodded against his head. The MECH agent began wrapping his wrists behind him with twine. Erin cried, her dark, curly ponytail was limp and messy against the floor as she watched Jake being bound.

Once he had finished with Jake, he put the gun back in his pocket and began doing the same to Erin.

Somewhere behind them in the backyard, a green light appeared. The MECH agent froze.

"SHIT!" he said and started to reach for the gun that he had relinquished, but even before the words escaped his mouth, a large hand punched through the back door and grasped him around the ribs, lifting him easily off of of the couple.

"M-080, I saw a trace of green light near your location, report?" a static connection said from the agent's earpiece that had fallen out.

The agent screamed with terror as Kirsten's hand brought him out of the house and into the night sky.

Kirsten looked at the back of his head in disgust and let out a squeamish cry when she closed her eyes tightly and squeezed the agent bitterly. She immediately shook her body free from repulsion after she had heard his screams turn to gags and she then heaved the broken body far into the ocean as far as she could. She cried a little bit in her processor, in a human way. She did it, she killed a MECH agent. She felt like throwing up, trying to convince herself that she needed to, that it was a necessity.

The fallen earpiece from the agent crackled below her. She was stunned that she could hear it.

"M-080, this is M-019, what is your status!?" a man from the other end said. Kirsten grunted and picked up the earpiece with the tiny microphone inside instead.

"M-019, where are you?" she said deviously into the piece. She stood up tall to see over the fence. She saw a dark van start his motor in the alley and began to back up, the tires whining against the pavement and skidded on stray sand. She reached out and crushed the van's motor and lifted the van to her eye level.

"You track them down again, I will kill you. You make sure and tell your superior that I am watching you. **ALL OF YOU**!" she screamed at him and then flung his van to the next street over, making sure that he survived to deliver the message, just like Megatron had said.

She collapsed against the grass in the backyard, her abdomen churning. She heaved a few times, feeling the memory of the reflex get the better of her nerves, but she quickly regained her composure and knelt to look into the back door where her mom had just finished untieing Jake's binds.

Her spark skipped several pulses, it was the first time she had seen her parents since she was kidnapped, and she was relieved. Her voice cracked shakily as she tried to reach out to her mom and dad through the busted door.

"M-mom, dad..." she felt her human emotions taking over her, but her Cybertronian body wouldn't allow her to cry or breathe hard, "It's m-me.." her bottom lip quivered and her hand reached in to them.

"Kirst...en?" Jake said, "My baby girl?" Jake said and jumped to his feet off the floor.

Erin covered her mouth with her hands, they both could see her face in the alien body. They walked slowly to her, and Kirsten tried to crawl through the back door into her childhood home once again, tearing up more of the wall the more she tried. She stopped when she had pulled her waist through the entrance and then looked at her parents closely under her.

"It's me." she said again, reassuring them that it was really sure, what she really wanted was a hug, a hug from them both, the hugs that meant so much to her that she would do anything to feel them again. Even crawl on the floor, begging as she was.

"You're one of them..." Jake said, walking closer to her, Erin following with her hand in his. "But you're alive." he said, continuing his sentence and then placing a hand on her right cheek.

"Kirstie, I can't believe it's...it's you." Erin said to her, mimicking Jake's gesture, and they all embraced in a hug, a large hug that encompassed her face and shoulders. Kirsten wrapped her arms behind them, squeezing them to her, jogging the memory of the musky smell of her father and the powdery smell of her mother.

An entire half a year's worth of emotions suddenly spilled from Kirsten's mouth. "I love you!" she sobbed without tears, "I killed a man! I'm so sorry!" she buried her head between them, "I had to... I had to. I had to."

"Shh, baby girl it's alright." her father comforted into her audio receptor.

"You must have been through so much already, hun, we're just happy to see that you're here." her mother told her gently, "We missed you so much!" she cried against Kirsten's cheek.

"I missed you too, mom." Kirsten tried to sniff but couldn't, she tried to cry but couldn't, at least she could still hug her parents, even if she was a giant in comparison.

"You guys have to leave, MECH won't stop there, I have to take you somewhere safe." Kirsten managed to say without her voice cracking.

Erin looked at Jake, and when Jake acknowledged her with a glance, she spoke, "Where should we go? That man was a police officer."

Kirsten thought about it for a moment. She remembered the map of Soundwave's logged MECH activities and all the dots around the world. She halfway smiled, knowing her dad would like the location she had decided on for them.

"How would you guys like to move to Costa Rica, and possibly adopt a 14 year old kid?"

* * *

A heavy load had lifted off of Kirsten's shoulders. Though the possibility that she would have to visit from time to time to make sure that everything in Costa Rica was safe still would arise. At least she didn't have to keep herself secret anymore. The hard and emotional good-bye between her and her parents was long but sweet. She had brought them to the ship, along with Ann and took them all straight to the beautiful town of Puerto Viejo, where there was never a documented sign of any MECH agents for a thousand miles, and her dad could surf forever to his heart's content.

It was a chapter in her life that had to take on a different perspective from here on out. Continuing alliances with the Costa Rican president, Laura Chinchilla who she got along real nicely with, agreed to secretly house and shelter them all for a negotiated price of keeping the peace between the neighboring countries. Powerful women bonded with each other she guessed.

It had been a week, Soundwave and Megatron had not offered too much help, seeing what all she could do by herself. They were surprised to learn that she had also negotiated an underwater energon mining deal with the country in return for picking the government-owned farms harvest of bananas for as long as they were there mining.

Megatron chuckled loudly and didn't intend to stop anytime soon. His loud cackle filled up the entire bridge room. "You traded energon mining rights for..." he coughed as his chuckles died down, "harvesting bananas?" He squinted his eyes towards her as he smiled deviously, "How simple."

"It's a great source of economic income for them, and it is easy labor on our part, Lord Megatron." She said proudly in front of him as she reported the last of the information.

"I certainly hope we destroyed all of our own information that we gave to MECH. Who would have known that it was so easy to win the humans over by merely harvesting their fruit. MECH, those hundreds of mongrels... we tried making the wrong alliances." He sneered at Kirsten who lifted her eyebrow plates proudly again.

"You have done very well, Kirsten. Needless to say, I was skeptical. Don't make me change my mind in the future. When you are able to fly, I will be having you travel the entire planet doing similar operations. Soundwave will let you know your future task when it is time. " Megatron dismissed himself and then walked away.

Kirsten smiled, her face beamed. It had been a few days since she had been back to the ship during the working hours. She had only returned to recharge and fuel up, and then bridge back down to the Central Americas, scouting the area and meeting the politicians. She got off easy. Costa Rica was a laid-back, peaceful country with little trouble, and a fruitful off-shore energon deposit. Her parents would be safe and no one was to breathe a word that they were there. They had all taken on different names, even Ann, who wanted to be renamed Rosario for her hair, the color of a rose.

"You haven't been around for a while," a voice suddenly said behind her. Kirsten turned and it was Knock Out, standing with a hand on his waist, holding a stick.

"I've been busy." Kirsten said, ready to fall back into the Decepticon routine. "All of this negotiation takes time."

"Not unless you threaten them!" Knock Out said with a crooked laugh, "That way, its quicker and establishes power." He looked into her optics smugly.

"But humans don't like being threatened, see what happened with MECH? We are just as cunning and underhanded as you."

"Might I remind you who you refer to as 'we' again." Knock Out said delicately, walking beside her, "Your wings are developing nicely, it looks like you will be an agile flyer, not fast, but at least agile."

"How can you tell?" Kirsten said, offended that he intentionally said 'not fast'.

"Well that's just what I see!" They stopped walking and he grabbed her by the wings.

"Ow!" she said, as he tweaked them, "That really hurts!"

"It's because they're connected directly to your nervous system." He ran a finger slowly from her upper back down to her lower back. "Here. Just like your old body."

She shivered at the touch, it felt really good, and Knock Out knew it. "Come with me to my room, I need to do a follow-up on you anyway since you're back."

When they arrived at the doorway to the operating room, Soundwave was approaching from the other end of the hall. Not that he was spying, he just happened to be moving in that direction already. Watching Knock Out take her into the room, he followed, curious to see what the good doctor had in store for her on her recent return.

"Well, hello Soundwave," Knock Out said as the larger mech made his presence known in the room. Knock Out rolled his optics as he grabbed a device, "What do you need?" Knock Out proceeded to examine Kirsten's back and wings with an x-ray device.

Soundwave displayed Kirsten's next mission on his visor, he needed to brief her on her future endeavor into the grasslands of Mongolia.

"Why don't you brief her right now while she's sitting still, I won't mind." Knock Out said from behind her. "Besides, don't you want to make sure her wings are in perfect order before she starts flying all over this planet?" he smirked and lifted a brow plate at Soundwave.

Soundwave displayed to Knock Out his intended duties at the time, and among that list, Kirsten wasn't on it.

"An oversight, I'm sure." Knock Out ignored him, shining a light into her eye.

It took all of his effort not to blast Knock Out in his pretty face right then. Not only was he ignoring Soundwave, a superior, he was ignoring Megatron's orders. He showed Knock Out a timeline of his day. Soundwave, always ahead of schedule, had time to wait. He didn't trust him one bit. He planted his feet and crossed his arms.

Fine, Knock Out thought, he could play this game too. Glancing at Soundwave from the side, Knock Out got out all of his tools. The reflex hammer, the solder laser, the torque wrench, the cable guides, the rotary saw, and the cross cutters. He dumped them noisily all at once on the table. He nodded to Kirsten and she looked at all the tools that he had strewn on the table by her hips. This circumstance seemed vaguely familiar to her, the seeming rivalry between the two of them.

Flattering though it was to realize that two large and powerful mechs seemed to be competing for her attention, she felt awkward. She knew what Soundwave wanted, he had made that clear already. Knock Out on the other hand, seemed to have wanted the same thing as early as Soundwave but she didn't think him serious at all about it, she just thought he was an asshole. Now, she wasn't so sure. He had definitely made a conscious effort to be nicer to her. But Soundwave, he had always respected her even as a subordinate.

Knock Out began tapping on her knee joints and then moved to the joints where her wings attached. He tapped in the crevices, pulling muffled "mmph"'s from Kirsten's mouth when he would hit a sensitive wire. This made Soundwave furious, watching him touch her like that. Provoking such noises from her was inappropriate. How had Knock Out suddenly developed the ball bearings to act in such a way in front of him, he wondered. He must think he deserved something.

"**WHY ARE YOU ALL IN HERE!?**" a gruff voice yelled to them from the outside. "You all have work to do!" Megatron said, stepping into the room after being distracted on his pass-by. He walked forward and glared at Kirsten, "THIS, is not work." he said, holding an accusing finger at her.

Knock Out placed his hands on his hips and glared at Soundwave, who uncrossed his arms, as they stared accusingly at each other.

"GO!" Megatron yelled again, and the mechs slowly left the room. "Stay." Megatron said as he placed a heavy arm on Kirsten's shoulder and stopped her from leaving the room.

When they were alone, Megatron looked down to her with interrogating optics. She was terrified. Had she done something wrong? Should she have known better than to let them duel out some kind of masculine alpha status?

Megatron looked her up and down, picking his words appropriately and directly. There was a reason that most femmes didn't come into battle and it wasn't because they couldn't handle it. It was because it distracted the mechs too much. The magnetic aura that they would give off because of their particular genetic code had been known to cause trouble in the past and Megatron didn't doubt that it would now, even if she wasn't a purebred. Having been created outside of the traditional Cybertronian beginnings of life, her own evolutionary DNA bindings to the specific gender still had been transferred.

"We are animals..." Megatron said deeply. "Fierce, impetuous, animals. Evolution can only take so much away over time. Don't let the hard exterior fool you into thinking we are like your human robots, mechanicals. We have a similar evolutionary path as humans do but we are eons beyond your species in terms of time. Megatron towered over her and leaned in closer the more he talked. Kirsten backed up to the table and hit it, placing her hands behind her on the table for stability. "The feral nature of simple survival never goes away..." he finished.

Megatron leaned further into her and placed both of his arms on either side of her, close to crushing her with his massive chest. He lowered his head down to hers majestically and growled. "What have I been telling you this entire time?" He feathered his helm next to hers, being pulled in by the energon processing that produced those certain magnetic pheromones.

Kirsten realized what he was doing, he had been training her this whole time for this. She leaned back and lifted her legs and gave Megatron a hard and abrupt shove in the abdomen. Megatron stumbled backwards, not prepared for the sudden contact, surprised that she even responded.

"Be direct, be strong, and don't be afraid?" She said to him, amazed at her own retort. Megatron stared at her from the small distance she'd put between them and then his lip curled upwards in the corner of his mouth. She began walking out of the room without another word, she didn't feel the need to explain herself.

Megatron watched her walk out and turn the corner. He chuckled inside, she was stronger than he thought. Gladly, too. As much as he respected Soundwave, the presence of a femme on board was always a hard task to look away from. He would have to reassess his own self-control, if not for Soundwave, then for himself as a leader.

* * *

Days were eventually passing. Kirsten was surprised at how fast the days went when she had work to do. Researching Mongolia was the task. She'd always wanted to visit Asia, she was thrilled when she realized she would get her chance to visit every continent on the planet without buying a fortune's worth of plane tickets.

Soundwave had been busy sending Laserbeak into Mongolia, trying to get a lay of the land. Decepticon miners had already been sent into neighboring China and Russia but both of those governments were assumed to be affiliated with MECH. Mongolia might prove to be easier, they thought, and the energon deposits were very fruitful.

Soundwave knew she would need to have weaponry attached soon, her wings were almost fully developed and that meant that she would be working independently when he would teach her to transform and fly. When the clumsiness of trying to get used to a new body finally went away, he noticed how light she was on her feet and how her entire body movements worked simultaneously for keeping her balance when turning, jumping, and running. He wondered if it was because of her previous sport of choice, surfing, that made her so agile. His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the very agile surfer he was thinking about, making her way to him from across the bridge room.

"Soundwave..." she started, and he turned to face her, wondering what she had to report. "I was doing some research and I wanted to propose an idea to you and Megatron.

Soundwave dipped his head forward, motioning for her to continue.

"We have two small teams of miners in the northern regions of China which we haven't asked permission for. If I were to propose that we pull those miners in order to secure a loyal connection to Mongolia without China's interference, what do you think Megatron would say?" she looked up at him with questioning eyes.

Soundwave certainly didn't think she would become this involved so early on, it was almost like it was the role that she was made for. Soundwave thought it was a good idea, she had shown initiative in Costa Rica, and now Mongolia, and she knew her own species better than any of them. What they needed to really make sure of was not making any deals with anyone associated with MECH.

Soundwave nodded and motioned for her to follow him. She did, and walked behind him to where Megatron was.

"Yes, Soundwave?" he said when he was approached.

Soundwave drew a depiction of Kirsten's plans on his visor, indicating the miners move from the regions of China into Mongolia when a negotiation passed.

"Why would I do that? The Chinese haven't caused us any mischief since being there." Megatron said to Soundwave.

Kirsten spoke up after Soundwave, "Yes, Lord Megatron, but if we were to negotiate a deal with Mongolia for their own benefit, China is their neighbor and will soon expect something as well. I propose we might as well leave China and have them begging us to come back so that we can give them something rather than them demanding getting something from us while we're there. It puts the decision in our favor because northern China is rich in energon as well." Kirsten continued, explaining what Soundwave showed.

"Hmmm..." Megatron thought and then shook his head. "You know these creatures better than I do, but what would keep them from demanding payment from us for using their land previously..?"

Kirsten opened her mouth but then had no answer. She thought about that for a while. Soundwave stepped forward and answered for her. He brought up one of the documented MECH involvements with the government that was supposed to stay secret. It was only a small selection of particular members of the party that was involved. China was a single-party state, so if not everyone was involved in this knowledge, if it was needed, blackmail could be considered.

"I am taking more of a liking to this idea now..." Megatron said, "We will let MECH step on their own feet...and then we still have the advantage of bargaining power." Megatron cracked a smile, "Do it." he said.

* * *

Kirsten had written a letter to the Mongolian parliament and instantly had received a reply, stating that they would like to meet with her. She was ecstatic, hopefully it would go as well as the one in Costa Rica did.

The next day, Soundwave helped her put the coordinates in the groundbridge and she was sent off on her own again. Soundwave was overseeing the operation from the Nemesis to make sure everything went correctly since she still was without weapons, which might prove to be beneficial for meeting with the humans. They had notified the miners in China to halt work and return to the ship for the time being.

Soundwave opened the groundbridge for her and she stepped through, glancing his way before entering, as she always did, for comfort.

The meeting location was a Buddhist temple outside of the city of Ulaanbaatar since they deemed her too large to meet within city limits. They wanted to have a traditional greeting in a humble location so that she may learn what Mongolians want in reference to the religious majority.

Kirsten wanted to be as respectful and peaceful with them as she possibly could be, although she knew that the Decepticons may have approached the situation from a more threatening standpoint. She explained to them what the Decepticons wanted and the parlimentary members explained to her what they would expect in return for their privacy and use of their land. Kirsten could honestly say that they had no ties with any bordering country yet, as the negotiations were quite new.

The Mongols were looking mostly for peace and a security from their neighbors who harvested power like the other western countries. Kirsten knew she couldn't negotiate that since they would want ties with China and Russia too eventually so they agreed on the use of land in return for mining the tin and aluminum from the land as well. Energon grew in the areas where aluminum and other metals were fairly abundant but hard to mine so while they mined energon, they would mine and refine the indigenous metals as well. Simple, easy, efficient for both parties.

As Kirsten watched the humans leave, a warm feeling came over her. She was looking at the forest and the plains and began to walk away from the temple to look at the mountains. Everything looked the same but yet slightly different when she would really focus. She couldn't feel the breezy wisps of wind on her arms, but she could at least still hear the leaves rustling in the distance. She longed for the ocean suddenly, she felt lonely. The ocean calmed her, made her feel strong and made her feel like she was never alone. It always breathed and it was always there.

She then thought of Soundwave, wondering why he hadn't taken any chance to be intimate lately. He had seemed so interested when she was a human, maybe he wasn't that interested anymore. Maybe she didn't have the right parts. 'Nah,' she thought, she had felt those, they were there. Perhaps it was the lack of privacy and seclusion. They were both always working on the bridge. She sat on the grassy field, waiting for Soundwave to open a bridge to her. She wanted him to want her, she needed his company, she enjoyed all of her thoughts about him. A smile grew on her face as she closed her eyes and daydreamed of things she could do when she returned to let him know that she was still interested in him, if he didn't know already. Her dreams ended when a green light opened in front of her. She got up and began walking to it but as instantly as she got up, two large Autobots stepped out of the light, Smokescreen and Arcee, pointing their weapons at her.

"Don't move!" Arcee yelled.

"I'm unarmed!" Kirsten said back, holding her hands up in surrender. Her eyes widened as they got closer, their cannons pointing at her face and chest. She stepped back a few times as they approached.

"We'll see about that." Smokescreen said, holding up a device to her that Rachet had given him.

Kirsten panicked and she turned around and began to run as fast as she could. She wasn't about to hang around with Autobots without any kind of defense of her own. She saw red shots fly past her as Smokescreen started to fire towards her.

"We just want to talk!" Arcee yelled while they both chased her.

"Yeah right!" Kirsten yelled running. "Then why are you shooting me!?"

"Smokescreen, stop!" Arcee yelled at him.

"But she's a 'con!" He yelled back to her but Arcee grabbed his arm and flung it down to his side and they stopped chasing her.

Kirsten looked back and noticed they had stopped, so she stopped. The grassy fields were no place to hide, so she stood there, still, waiting for them to make a move. She locked optics with Arcee, the other female she'd heard about. Arcee noticed that what they were looking at was a femme, she immediately felt a connection.

Kirsten felt her energon pulse race and she felt a strange feeling in her chest, like she was choking. She lifted her arm unconsciously to put it on her neck and chest, but Smokescreen was still in defense mode when she lifted her arm.

"Arcee, careful she's gonna shoot!" And Smokescreen's trigger finger fired directly at Kirsten.

Kirsten was suddenly on the ground, a burning sensation taking over her left hip.

She had been hit.


	25. I need to feel

**A/N: Yeah I needed a trigger happy Smokescreen because that's just who he reminds me of. Passionate, but sometimes too passionate. Umm...warnings? language, Drugs (but hey I live in Colorado, weed is legal here)**

**LOVE YO FACES *****heart* ~K **

Ch 25: I need to feel

Kirsten screamed when she hit the ground and grabbed her upper leg. It didn't hurt as much as she had anticipated but it was right in the joint so when she tried to get up and run, it hurt more than the hit itself.

"Smoke, stop!" Arcee said to him again, "She's unarmed!" she punched him and pushed him to the side and walked toward Kirsten. Arcee tapped into her communication. "Optimus, we have a weird situation, it's a 'con we've never seen before, a femme."

Kirsten grunted and clenched her teeth at the pain but still tried to get up. She hobbled away on one leg, trying to get as far away from them as she could, not moving very fast doing so though.

"Who are you?!" Arcee yelled at her from the side. She had caught up with Kirsten and demanded answers.

Kirsten just glanced her way but kept hobbling.

Arcee was curious as to where she'd seen this face before though. At first glance, she felt like she knew her, but something was off. But then it hit her. Arcee gasped when she realized that her face was the face of the missing girl from the MECH lab attack.

"You're that human!" Arcee said in disbelief. That was the connection. They had been looking for her, everyone had been. Optimus wasn't going to like this. If Megatron and the Decepticons had this kind of technology, they would be able to build a greater army in time.

"You'd better stay still 'con!" Smokescreen said and raised his cannon again and shot at her back, blasting her onto the ground again.

"Smokescreen!" Arcee yelled at him again.

This time, the pain raged in her back, right below her wings. Her face scraped against the small rocks in the grass as she tried again to get up, but this pain was more direct. She remembered how sensitive her back was when Knock Out had ran his finger over it, so naturally, it hurt 100x more to be shot on her back than it did on her leg.

Arcee was furious at Smokescreen, all he wanted to do was be a loyal Autobot but he just ended up being a trigger happy fighter sometimes. His job was to fight the Decepticons, no questions asked, and that's exactly what he did. Arcee held him back as they looked at her body lying in the grass, struggling to get up or move.

"We need to do something..." Arcee said, thinking that nurture would be the best option for the moment since she was unarmed, it was what Optimus would do anyway. They moved forward towards her until another ground bridge opened just above Kirsten's body and a large, angular, grey and indigo mech landed hard on the ground, making the earth shake and rumble beneath him. All of his cannons and Resonance Blaster pointed their way. Soundwave's visor lowered to them both, daring them to try and attack again.

"Shit, Soundwave..." Smokescreen whispered.

Soundwave crouched over her like an animal, protecting the smaller femme. The Resonance Blaster was charged and ready to go, but the Autobots did not advance to give Soundwave a reason to fire. They stood in position until two drones also came from the ground bridge and picked up Kirsten, who was whimpering in pain, hauling her back into the light. Soundwave never fired, but he backed up facing them, ready to fire if he had to. Arcee and Smokescreen lowered their weapons, and watched silently as Soundwave disappeared into the swirling green light.

* * *

Soundwave followed the drones to Knock Out's med bay. They laid her on the working table and Knock Out was ready to go, having known what had happened before she arrived.

"Mischevious Autobots, you know, just when we're trying to do things right for a change!" Knock Out said, flustered.

Soundwave watched him give Kirsten a nerve blocking anesthetic and began to repair her back. Kirsten's face crunched in agony and eventually relaxed as the anesthetic went to work. Laying on her front, her face rubbed against the table when she turned her head to try to look at Soundwave, who again, had saved her like some kind of fairytale prince charming. But she didn't feel like a princess, she felt like a burden. She realized her guilt and turned her head away from him.

But Soundwave didn't think her a burden, they would have watched over any Decepticon, two against one just isn't fair, that was just the unspoken rules of war. What he did feel, besides the guilt of not watching her meeting close enough to send help sooner, was the paranoia of an unintended dangerous situation that could have ended up worse. He knew that she was strong enough, agile enough, smart enough to outsmart and overcome obstacles, but she still hadn't been equipped with the proper weaponry, and that was his fault. Megatron had put her under his care for a reason, and now he wasn't following through on any of his plans because his thoughts had been derailed by jealousy. Jealousy, a stupid, primitive feeling that he had thought that he'd ridden himself of. Never again, he would never fall victim to it again. He trusted Kirsten too much, and he would have to let her know it soon or else it would slowly drive him mad, if it hadn't already.

* * *

"Mmmm." Kirsten's anesthetic was beginning to wear off, there was no more pain, but a strange tightness in her back and hip.

"Almost done." Knock Out said, sanding an edge of a fine wire just under her plating.

Kirsten looked down to where he worked by the edge of her leg and hip joint. She lifted her hands to her face and rubbed, grunting softly into them.

"Now now, it's not that bad." Knock Out said to her, turning and getting a polishing gun.

"It's not that..." she whispered into her hands, her words muffled into her metal wrists. She never had to fight before. She had taken a Karate class or two in her lifetime, but that wouldn't do any good now. She only hoped that she could reconcile herself to Soundwave and Megatron by learning to fight better in the future. "It's that it happened in the first place."

"It wasn't a fair fight, even if you had a weapon, they should know better." Knock Out said nonchalantly, as if it happened all the time. "And you're new at this." he smirked up at her, "And I know a few mechs who would be willing to teach you the basics." Knock Out got up and set his tools neatly back on the wall. "Good as new." he said to her. "Stretch."

Kirsten sat up on the table and moved her arms around, bending forward and bending backward, not feeling any kind of pain in her back. "I gotta admit, you're one hell of a doctor.." she said, amused.

"I know." He smiled and leaned on the table by her hip. "You know... I know a few things about fighting, contrary to popular belief." he chuckled.

She smiled at his words, relieved that he didn't consider her much of a burden. That was his profession, fixing things like this. She only hoped the same from Soundwave. She had felt so happy and angry at the same time when she realized that it was him standing over her, protecting her from the Autobots, but she wondered if he became weary from it. She didn't want to be that one. She didn't want to be the weak one.

"So, we should talk about weapons at some point." Knock Out told her, still leaning on the table.

Kirsten nodded, "Yeah, can I get something powerful right here?" She put her hand on her wrist.

Knock Out gave out a single laugh, then turned serious again, "You'll need more than that. We can talk about that...well.. maybe over some high-grade energon sometime." He looked at her with convincing optics, deep, glowing, red questions, "Maybe tonight..."

"Tonight?" Kirsten asked him. "High-grade?"

"You know, two beautiful beings seeing where the discussions take us, where the night might take us..." Knock Out leaned into her, taking his hand and brushing it just below her chin to tilt her head up slightly. Kirsten soon realized his intention, she had hoped that he wasn't as serious as she had suspected, but it seemed as though he was. She needed to finally let him down delicately.

Kirsten lifted a hand and braced it against Knock Out's chest, pushing against him so he wouldn't get any closer. She was silent, and tried to pick her words. She didn't want to suddenly be on his bad side again. From past experience, rejection had never set well with the boys she'd gone out with before and she didn't expect any different now.

"Knock Out..." she said, his face demanding to be closer, with obvious expectations. "I'm flattered, but...I—no." she shook her head. "You're...you're just not my type." She flinched at her own words, feeling suddenly bad and guilty for saying them as she watched the shape of his eyes change from yearning, to a shape of disbelief.

Knock Out couldn't believe it. Seriously? She had rejected him? Seriously?! Knock Out dropped his head down to the floor and started to chuckle nervously. He pushed his hand off the table from her side and began to pace for nothing in particular. Knock Out, the charmer, the casanova, had just been directly rejected? He placed his hands on his hips and tilted his head upwards and then down, venting as he did so. He finally looked at her, "Really?" He said with aggression, "**I'm** not your type?" He emphasized himself, "**Nobody** is your type, hybrid, but I think I'm pretty damn close!"

"Knock Out, I'm sure you're wo-"

"It's Soundwave isn't it." He clenched his fists as he interrupted her and then focused on her face, waiting for an answer. It terrified him, to know that Soundwave, somehow the silent, ominous Soundwave could do what he could not, and there was nothing he could do about it. "There's no room for me is there?" Knock Out seemed to express sadness in his angry, quivering voice, "Because it's all taken, by him." Knock Out's optics seemed to glow dimmer with every word, and the slits around them became thinner.

Kirsten nodded, not saying a word. Yes, Soundwave was there, he was there all the time, in her thoughts and by her side, he would always be there. She opened her mouth and whispered his direction without eye contact, "He was always there. He's...done a lot...for me."

"But so have I!" Knock Out replied, his voice growing louder, "I've repaired you, I'm the one who worked on your human body, I'm the one who built your new body." He banged his fist on the table. "I even rescued you from MECH's base! And you're telling me that it means nothing to you!? That my own personal disgust was put aside for your tiny body many times to do **you** a favor, to save **your** life, and my hard work earns me nothing?!"

He flung his arms to the sides as he talked, he couldn't believe that even after all he had done against his own will wasn't worth even a night of discussion. He had inappropriately let himself think that he could win her over, knowing that Soundwave was the one that he was competing with, it should have been an easy victory. His voice was distressed, his shoulders dropped, "Nothing?" He repeated, a throaty growl following the word.

Kirsten didn't know what to say. He was right, he had done a lot for her. She didn't know that it was him that rescued her from the base's collapse, she felt an awful feeling growing in the pit of her abdomen, a dingy, guilty feeling. She wished there was something that she could say to him, but her mind had been made up a long time ago.

Knock Out finished rubbing his brow plates with his hands and groaned, "Fine." he said shortly, "It was Soundwave who contacted me in the first place to rescue you, so I guess he gets that point." he started pacing again, but not as aimlessly. He grabbed a rod from the wall and walked back to Kirsten, who watched his optics carefully.

"If it's any consolation, I appreciate all you've done." Kirsten's hand was suddenly grabbed by his and he placed the rod in her grasp. Knock Out's optics met hers, deep and luminous.

"It's no consolation, but I'll get over it." He said, closing her hand around the jagged rod.

"What's this?" she said.

"A list of weapons." He sighed, "Go through it." Knock Out said and leaned against the entrance to his bay. Kirsten got up and walked out of the room towards her allocated quarters without another awkward word, hoping she could just give him time to vent off while she learned the list and chose a weapon.

Knock Out closed and locked the bay door behind him, ready to wallow in self-pity without being interrupted.

It would have been an easy escape if Soundwave hadn't tapped into the video feed just moments earlier to suddenly see Knock Out wisp his hands across her chin amorously. Soundwave turned from his station and began walking the direct route to the doctor's med bay, on the attack.

* * *

Knock Out leaned back in his metal chair, a rolled up energon joint in his mouth. He couldn't deny that he was lonely, but he wouldn't ever admit that he needed anyone either. In a way, him and Soundwave were very similar. He shook his head at the thought. It would take years to create another body like Kirsten's, but maybe he'd just have to be willing to wait that long. He took the joint from his mouth and rolled it around in his hand, the buzz of the chemically refined energon relaxing his processor as it seeped into his body.

Knock Out heard a few clicks behind him coming from the door. He had locked it, who was trying to get in, he wondered. It opened soon after and Soundwave's shadow graced the entrance. Knock Out should have known, only Soundwave would be able to pick the locks on the battleship. The tall spy walked forward towards Knock Out and reached out suddenly, grabbing the doctor by his throat. Knock Out shouted in surprise but Soundwave flung him against the wall of his med bay and held him there against his will, choking off the doctor's vocal vibrations. Knock Out's feet dangled under him, trying to kick at Soundwave, but his arms were too long for him to reach.

"Soundwave...Sound—gah!" Soundwave's grip became harder when Knock Out tried to speak. Soundwave would show no mercy now, he had made up his mind. No one would get in the way, and he would send that message to the far reaches of the universe if he had to.

"What do you want?!" Knock Out choked out, still feeling the grip on his throat tighten and his body being shoved into the wall harder.

Soundwave showed Knock Out his recording of the video feed that he saw of him and Kirsten before he headed over to show him what he thought of it. He wouldn't stand for such actions and he was prepared to battle for it.

"Fuck! Soundwave, you're an idiot! She doesn't want me!" Knock Out yelled in his grasp, "She wants you! And if you're too fucking blind to see that, then maybe you don't deserve her!" Knock Out threatened with his strained voice while kicking at Soundwave's arms.

Usually the doctor would keep talking if he was lieing. Soundwave noticed how Knock Out turned his head to the side in defeat, not even wanting to look at Soundwave. He had been beaten. Soundwave considered that he was telling the truth, that Kirsten had shown no interest in him. Knock Out's optics told the story. Soundwave looked closer at them. They were sparkbroken. He was telling the truth.

Soundwave didn't dismiss Knock Out's humiliation so easily though. He didn't pity him, he didn't let him down smoothly, that's not who he was in the past, and that wasn't going to change today. He dropped Knock Out harshly on the floor from the wall. Soundwave bent over and picked up Knock Out's joint and brought a hand to his visor. Grinding and clicking, it popped loose, and Soundwave put the joint in his mouth as he lowered his mask in his other hand.

Knock Out got to his feet, brushing off the debris from the floor. He heard Soundwave's deep steps as he was on his way out and all Knock Out got to see of him when he focused his optics was his back turning the corner out of his room.

"Message received..." Knock Out muttered to himself, and began rolling himself another.

* * *

Kirsten sat on the chaise berth in her quarters, leaning up against the wall as she went through the list of appropriate weapons for her size. Incredibly, the rod, when activated created a window of light that she could scroll through, like a reader. A few weapons had caught her attention, while they all were developed in the same concepts, the way they were mounted were the things that caught her attention. Some mounted on shoulders, some on wrists. She wondered if Knock Out had all of these readily available or if these were limited. Either way, she found it all fascinating.

While she was scrolling through the list more, she heard a beeping at her closed door. Surprised, because no one had ever contacted her in her quarters, she froze at the sight of her door opening and Soundwave's sillouhette leaning to one side of the door frame, his armed crossed in front of his chest. His body was shadowed from the light that came in from the hallway but she could see his glowing optics within the shadows of his facial features.

Her spark tumbled over several times seeing him in such a personal confrontation, realizing that he was at her entrance, with his mask removed. She stared at the shape of his optics, they looked at her lowly, lustfully and deliciously. He took a few steps forward, inviting himself into her room, and he closed the door behind him, clicking it locked remotely. He wouldn't make any mistakes now, he would make clear to her how he needed her.

He moved quickly and undetectably around her. Kirsten dropped the rod out of her grasp when she felt his hand suddenly appear at her side and scoop her into a desirous embrace against him. He had somehow already made his way to her berth and locked her against it. She shivered against his touch, she had wanted to feel him so bad since their last encounter and she longed for him for the first time since her transformation.

He brought his other hand to her face and roughly drew his fingers across her cheek and down her pouty bottom lip. Kirsten's head fell backwards at the magnetic sensations he was drawing up through her. Her shoulders shifted around as he dipped his face into the crevices of her neck, rubbing sensitive, exposed wires. His hand shifted and settled in the back of her head and slowly, he curled his fingers against the sensitivity that was her nervous system, from the base of her head, down towards her wings. It felt like icy tingles to Kirsten, the type that sent electrical sparks throughout her entire body.

In the lowly-lit room, Kirsten could make out the scars on his face and circuitry running from his eye into his helm with him being so close. she grabbed onto his chest, noting that Laserbeak had made herself scarce and exited his body before he arrived. He loved the feeling of dominating over her and letting her know that he had all intention of claiming her for himself. Finally having her exactly where he wanted her made him smirk victoriously. They exchanged unsaid passion behind those closed doors, privately and untamed.

* * *

After an undisclosed amount of time had passed, Soundwave was ready to treat urn to work, but not before he did something very important. He took his hand and placed it above Kirsten's breast plating and began carving a tiny symbol, his symbol. Kirsten held very still while he did so, a little shocked, not familiar with Soundwave's ritual being performed. She hadn't studied anything about Cybertronians branding each other, it must've been a Soundwave thing.

Kirsten began getting hot in the cheeks when Soundwave looked directly into her optics after that and she turned her head slightly, shyly, realizing that this was to be her future. Soundwave was to be her guidance into the life of being alien, of being different, and of never being alone. She knew how to communicate with him, he knew that she could be patient with his choices and most of all, he could trust her.

Soundwave silently reattached his visor. He stood, picking up the rod on his way up. He opened the window and scrolled through it. Kirsten looked up beside him and peered at the weapon he paused at. He began tapping the screen at. It was a duel cannon on both arms, best for fast moving subjects, not a lot of power, but if accurate, could do a lot of damage. Kirsten liked it, she couldn't wait to finally be complete with wings and a weapon. She looked at him and nodded, a smile tugging at her lips. Soundwave proceeded to make his way out of the room to alert Knock Out, but not before showing her where the communal showers were.

A few moments in a hot oil shower made Kirsten feel refreshed and relubed. It was her first oil shower and while her human showers focused on getting her clean and fresh, this type of shower not only refreshed her joints, but also made her shiny. She was to meet Soundwave in Knock Out's med bay in a short amount of time. It was quite easy getting ready nowadays, she didn't have to worry about what she wore, how to put her hair, or which shoes would be most comfortable. It was just...her, and a soon to be weapon.

Kirsten liked the fact that she could still be an independent, functioning person and that Soundwave didn't feel the need to lay everything out on the table for her to understand. She felt springy in her steps as she exited the shower and began the short walk to Knock Out's room where they should both be waiting.

* * *

In a small cave, in the remote regions of Nevada...

"Optimus, I saw her with my own optics!" Arcee pleaded to Optimus Prime. "It was that girl that the government has sent constant pictures of!"

"How are you so sure of this Arcee?" Optimus boomed in his dramatically deep voice that reverberated across the cave.

"It... it was..." Arcee tried to look back, what was it that had caught her attention, "Her eyes, and the lips! They were the same shape and NO femme has lips like that! It was like she was some kind of mix between a human and us...I saw her expression..." she became quieter, "I saw her body..." she shook her head, almost thinking that she was as crazy as Optimus might've been thinking.

"Arcee, would you be willing to scout out this femme again and put a fact to your theory?" Optimus said.

"Yes sir." Arcee responded immediately.

"Because if the Decepticons have this kind of technology, I'm afraid we might have to start counting our human heads..."

**A/N: yes yes this is revised and I have decided after persistent comments and thoughts, all of you readers just make me smile so much! In the next chapter I'll explain myself...*  
**

**Also, this is a new revised version of this chapter, without smut, as I really want it. Sorry to the smut fans:) I again, would like to have this be a real romance and not trash. Thx! Love u all! ~K**


	26. Quest for fire

**Only ch 25 referenced:**

**haleo86: Oh you're welcome! Hmm in response to the spark-merging...what is spark merging? I've seen it in a few fics where they do that, but... I dunno, I'm not really into it. I kind of feel as if it's something made popular only in fic writings as an easy way to explain marriage in an alien format. So.. I'm kind of making my own up as I go lol... Thanks for being awesome :D**

**zrexhearts and Mercedes Wolfcry: I think I shall incorporate a KO luvin' into this story ;) I've got a separate plan for Mego in a different fic I'm working on.  
**

**PoP: you've been just awesome girl, I think you just hit the nail on the head. Yeah, there IS so much more to go and I will address all of that, well played anon, well played ;) BTW flattered to know that you've stuck to my story:D**

**thelostzelda: exactly what I was thinking about if I continued the story, but then I became fatigued. You're awesome review has helped rekindle that spark:) I'm so happy to hear that you like it:)**

**Autobot Princess Arcee and Taboo22: Ahhh what can I say! THANKS for all your reviews and luv!**

**deathwingseeker: Flattered, and darn it, if I wasn't human maybe I could stop abusing the comma so much,,,,,Thanks for the inspiration:)**

**NoodlesInWonder: Yes, I believe I've been motivated to answer all of the open-ended questions for you and for myself, I'd LOVE to continue writing, I hope that it meets standards! Haha ;D**

**falconaiur: Wow thank you! I am happy to hear that you like her:) Soundwave has to be the hardest character to write in order to KEEP him in character! And he's incredibly challenging, finding new ways to communicate, keeping him from speaking, it certainly takes a toll!**

**Fire Black Dragon: Oh man I totally agree! I just needed to hear that in order to keep my motivation afloat. You are spot on, yes the ending was dry, and like I have explained, it was probably because I became tired of the story and I wanted to escape from it, so easy out, but I would love to continue the story now that I see that it has actually a good chance of still being read:) Thanks and any critique is always welcome!**

**SilverNiera: I know right! Relationships are so hard for me to write quickly, and I feel like if I rush them then they're cheesy, if I draw it out it's boring. I don't even like to write "I love you". It's just... I dunno my beef with it writing such a blunt emotion. It's something I feel like I can portray better in actions than in words.**** THAANKS:) **

**Rendianami: YOU... oh man, YOU! That review just solidified my decision to keep on going and revise the ending. I like to put out what the fans like to eat ;) What I am wondering is... how did you get inside my mind!? I'm like aw crap now all these open ends are here, but meh...I don't care. Now I do care! I will take the beating like a proper artist and rectify myself with heeding those comments that bear my weight! Thanks so much:)**

**Did I get everyone? And we continue...**

***Below starts chapter 26**

Ch 26: Quest for fire

In Knock Out's med bay, Kirsten was laid back on the tilted table, the table that she knew almost better than her own berth she'd been assigned to, and she once again was ready to undergo another procedure.

Knock Out was cold and unresponsive to her. He seemed as though he was still angry about what had happened earlier. Which was to be expected, Kirsten thought. She would probably feel the same way.

Soundwave hadn't come to the room yet, but had left strict instructions for Knock Out to follow.

Knock Out prepared the cannons without words, polishing and oiling them before preparing her arms to attach them to.

Kirsten followed him around the room with her optics, waiting for a chance to make peace with him. But he never even looked at her. He was still bothered by the idea that his best and his charm wasn't good enough to even break the surface with her. The primitive competition of some kind of alpha status had only concluded one thing, that he wasn't the alpha. He eventually approached her, with one weapon in hand, finishing up preparing the joints of it's attachment points. He looked from the weapon to her face and then back down again without a word.

Kirsten was driving herself crazy thinking of the best time to say something to him, it was too silent in the room to even be in there without one of them going completely crazy.

"I-you..um..." Kirsten stuttered out as Knock Out took a seat by her on his working chair. Knock Out swiftly held up a hand in her face, shushing her and shaking his head.

"..No...don't even try." Knock Out said immediately. He sanded her arm surface, preparing for the contact. His eyes wandered up her chassis and found the engraving of Soundwave's symbol just above her left breast hump. 'What the hell' he thought...He diverted his eyes quickly, was Soundwave trying to make Knock Out feel like a pile of shit on purpose? It was just a reminder of his loss, a constant sign that he didn't give his best.

As he was attaching the weapons, Kirsten and Knock Out shared a long awkward silence. He tried to look focused on his work, even though he wasn't, and Kirsten tried to keep herself busy by finding random things in the room to be interested in. 'Oh, look at the seam in that wall.'

...

"Okay..." Knock Out finally said, after an hour had finally passed and he was finishing up buffing the weapons. Kirsten looked at the newly installed cannons on her arms, nice, she thought. Knock Out took the buffer to a small section of the seams and perfected his work, then he sat still and ran his optics over the rest of her body. His eyes rested on Soundwave's engraving. "Need me to buff that out too?" he said while reaching the buffer over to her upper chest plating.

Kirsten's optics widened and she scrambled away from the approaching buffer, hitting the floor with a clang. Knock Out stood over her on the floor, a decent revenge. Small, but gratifying.

"Okay do this." Knock Out said to her, and he held out his arms, and twitched his wrists. Kirsten, frowning still at the doctor, got to her feet hesitantly and followed his instruction. She twitched her wrists upward and the cannons fell inside her arms. She twitched them again, and they appeared again. 'Cool', she thought.

"How do I fire?" Kirsten asked Knock Out, intentionally pointing one of the cannons at him, a returned revenge back at him.

Knock Out squinted his optics spitefully at her and swiftly swung a leg out, kicking her legs out from under her. Again, he had been forced to take on work that he wasn't happy about, especially at the moment, and he wasn't about to let her think she was as equally qualified as they were, he'd have to keep her in her place. Especially since he had no rewards to reap from it anymore.

"Intuitively." Knock Out spat.

"You're being such an ass! I don't think I deserved that!" Kirsten spat back at him, brushing the debris from the floor off of her when she got back to her feet. She found Knock Out just inches from her face very suddenly after.

"You-don't deserve ANY of this." He said in her face. They were soon playing a dangerous game of who can stare the longest at each other without falling back. Optics dimmed, faces tensed, and a few moments later Kirsten spoke.

"And yet, here I am...still." She began to walk forward when her facial expression turned from malice to emotional pain, shifting her shoulder around him to get pass. She thought not about Knock Out in the same way she thought about Soundwave, so how did he still make her emotional bearings break down with such simple words. Knock Out caught the edge of her wrist with his own hand before she put too much distance between them. He vented a strong stream of hot air and shut his eyes regretfully.

"Kirsten..." he said, not wanting to apologize, but not wanting to send her off with extreme animosity toward him either. She stopped when she felt him tug on her wrist. She was trembling, she wanted to be his friend, but it seemed as though if he couldn't just be a friend, then there could be nothing. Knock Out turned around and began a slow pace towards his door. "Let's...open a ground bridge to someplace and...we'll get Soundwave to teach you."

Knock Out wasn't a natural peace-keeper, so those words were hard for him to get out of his mouth. He felt better for saying them, but still felt as if it wasn't what he truly wanted to do or say. But he knew he should. If he ever chose another human female to hybridize, at least Kirsten was teaching him some good lessons about handling such situations.

–

_At the Autobot base..._

"Agent Fowler, is it true that the girl from the MECH base is still missing, and not confirmed dead?" Optimus spoke to him over the screen. Fowler was going through some paperwork and scrolling through his computer on another screen.

"As far as we know, she has not been located, and her parents have disappeared as well." Fowler said with his hand resting in his chin at the desk. "And you know what else? A 14 year old kid is also missing, hasn't shown up to school in months. Family has no idea, school has no idea..."

"Was she also affiliated with the MECH base under attack?"

"From the looks of it, she was related to the head of MECH's chemical science department. That's all we have on record. What I am still baffled by, is the fact that some of my colleagues were found in that base," Fowler shook his head, "We've got a serious case of betrayal on our hands."

"That means there could be more." Optimus said back. "The Decepticons seem to know something that we don't about MECH and have also seemed to have taken great strides in their developmental technology."

"What do you mean, Prime?"

"I fear that they might have the technology available to convert indigenous life to Cybertonian."

"You mean human to robot!?" Fowler jumped from his desk, "What we DON'T need is more Decepticons!"

"My thoughts exactly." Optimus said back. "We will keep a close watch on their activity as long as you do too. There has been rumors in our cave of the Decepticons negotiating with countries which have been Cybertronian-neutral. If we let them fall against us, we will also have our human allies breaking ranks with us too. And we need all the help we can get."

"Prime, I'll do my best, if any activity or alliances are reported, then you'll be the first to know."

Optimus was worried. If the Decepticons were to build up trust among the indigenous humans, that means they would have less alliance from them, and that wasn't an ideal situation.

* * *

In the remote desert of Africa, Kirsten, Soundwave, and Steve the eradicon spent time with shooting practice, aiming, and some other aspects of fighting.

Soundwave finished laying out a plan of action for Kirsten to follow in order to take down Steve. Kirsten nodded and Soundwave stepped back. Kirsten ran forward towards Steve but he dove to the side and shot at her with his cannon, luckily, she ducked and rolled and planted herself in the sand, shooting back at him. She couldn't hit him, he was too fast. She became frustrated and took a handful of sand and threw it, scattering it with a grunt. Suddenly, Steve transformed into his vehicle mode and stepped on it toward her. She had to think fast, side, no, side, shit, up? Yes! She jumped above him as he careened toward her and she shot downward as he passed under her. She hit him!

"Yes!" she said, tumbling back onto the earth. She turned to Soundwave to be judged, but was quickly struck down when she witnessed him walking towards her, shaking his head in disapproval. Her spark sank.

But- but she had finally hit him.

Soundwave showed her, what she should have done. Yes, she hit him, but, she shouldn't get into the habit of celebrating. Hit him, until he's down. It's not a game, it's war. He positioned her and Steve's dots on his visor, showing her what she could have accomplished had she kept shooting.

Kirsten nodded at him, it was a significant advancement for her, but she still had a long way to go. Discouraged, she hung her head and massaged the back of her neck, they had been out here for hours, after learning to shoot, learning to aim, and after learning to aim, it was learning to hit a moving target. All she wanted was some consolation that she was getting better, but the quick progress reaped none of that from Soundwave.

Soundwave clearly saw that she was frustrated, and rightly so. It was hard. But he didn't want to lend her any leniency either, he didn't want her to think it was going to be easier than it was. He was preparing her for war, it wasn't supposed to be effortless or innate. Feeling as if he should still give her some kind of reinforcement though, he came up close to her and brushed his shoulder against hers. His hand tucked underneath her chin and stroked it as he lifted it. They were body-to-body, leaving Steve in the distance to roll his eyes and turn away.

Kirsten suddenly felt a strange and uncomfortable pressure on her abdomen. She ignored it, loving the fact that Soundwave had finally given her some kind of motivation to continue. But the pressure became more intense. She finally looked down, to see both of Soundwave's weapons that extended from his tentacles prodding her, charged. She felt naïve, but she didn't look down for too long, she remembered Knock Out's surprising move that kicked her off of her feet and tried to immediately do it to Soundwave. She ducked and kicked, but he went nowhere. She tried kicking again, and he just looked down at her and tilted his head.

"Fine..." she huffed, and backed up, "I'll be more observant."

* * *

"Optimus, three Decepticon signals have been spotted in Africa." Rachet said to him.

Optimus nodded at Rachet and opened a communications link to Agent Fowler. "Fowler, we need you to send a drone confirmation over central Africa, we may have found our human."

"On it, Prime." Agent Fowler soon contacted the embassy in Morocco, to launch a search drone to the sent coordinates, if there was the confirmation that the new Decepticon was there, the Autobots would have to act fast in order to gather the information they wanted.

Soon after, Optimus was watching the drone's trajectory, it flew fast and it flew straight.

"Arcee, Bumblebee, Smokescreen, prepare for a ground bridge to Africa, Rachet, be ready to open upon confirmation."

Optimus knew that this was going to be especially difficult if they were in the middle of a negotiation with one of the countries. Most of the continent had been indifferent with making alliances with the Autobots so far, and remained neutral. But it was a large area, Optimus couldn't let them take even a small part of it, even if it was done peacefully, it was his fight to bring.

An hour passed, Optimus' optics never left the screen, vigilant though he was, he was nervous to see Arcee's theory face him directly on screen soon thereafter. The three Decepticons were spotted in the distance, the drone flew fast over them, not undetectably. He saw Soundwave, a Decepticon drone, and the unfamiliar one. The three of them looked at the drone on passover, and he took a still image.

"Rachet, picture of the girl." Optimus commanded. Rachet brought it up on screen. Optimus looked closely at the relationship of the features between the two of them. He was comparing the still to her school ID photo, the only one the government had on file. Optimus could see it. The shape of the eyes, the developed cheekbones that Cybertronians didn't have, the lips. No, she was far from being Cybertronian though upon a quick glance, she may fool the eyes. Optimus dreaded seeing the resemblance, even the shape of her neck and the way she stood gave it away. How did they do it, Optimus wondered.

"Ratchet, open the ground bridge." Optimus said slowly and deeply, suddenly intending on going with them, knowing that this kind of technology was not to be in the hands of their enemy.

**I know.. shorter than other chapters, but I didn't want to leave you all in the dark for too long.. I have plans now. Although, it's kind of all over the place, but the best part about getting from point a to point b is all the stretches of deviations in between. Stay focused for an update on my deviantart page, I'm working on a Kirsten prototype. Luv yo faces!**


	27. Taking Flight

**Yay you really like me! *LUUUUVn* ;) hugs to Asura-chan, deathwingseeker, CuteSparkling, Lady Stormdancer, PoP, NoodlesinWonder, thelostzelda, Mercedes Wolfcry, Taboo22, SilverStarlightXD, and zrexheartz! All of my commenters on ch 26 to give me the confidence for this chapter!:) And of course to EVERYONE who has ever commented, left a comment, a PM, favorited, followed, loves and luves!**  
**~K**

Ch 27: Taking Flight

As the surveillance UAV flew overhead, Soundwave pointed at Steve to fire. Steve shot many times before hitting it, causing it to finally crash. Soundwave looked up to see if there were any more on their way, but there was not. It wasn't safe anymore and he knew that they couldn't just fly away, both Steve and Kirsten were unable to. He sent a message to the Nemesis to send a ground bridge immediately to their location, but another one opened as soon as he patched the message through.

Four Autobots shot from the green light, landing heavily in the sand, weapons charged and ready. Soundwave moved to stand at the foreground of their Decepticon trio, standing confidant, tall, and menacing. They never played fair, always bringing more than necessary. And they wondered why the Decepticons were so hard on them and their 'backup'.

As if a start button was pressed, Bumblebee and Smokescreen began charging Steve. Optimus headed towards Soundwave while Arcee targeted Kirsten. Soundwave darted away from Optimus, knowing that he didn't have the type of power to take down a Prime, so he utilized all of his facets the best he could. His tentacles strung in horizontal directions and used distraction techniques to confuse Optimus. The tentacles tripped up against his ankle joints, straining the cables and pneumatics. Optimus stumbled around him and Soundwave ended up at his back, where he shot multiple shots at him. He glanced at Steve's and Kirsten's status as he took his aim.

Steve was always good at keeping the Autobots busy, especially the young Smokescreen and Bumblebee who didn't have the field experience like Optimus or Arcee. In another split second, he glanced at Kirsten and Arcee who, weren't even fighting. His optics captured Arcee holding a hand out to Kirsten in an offering. Kirsten looked at it confused. Multiple things ran through Soundwave's processor in a nanosecond. They were trying to get their secret technology, or they were offering her a better position on the other side, or, they were...it really didn't matter because his reaction would have been the same no matter what.

Soundwave re-aimed one of his cannons to Arcee and fired, making sure that the message was clear that they weren't about to divulge any information about anything. He hit her arm, the one she was holding out and surprisingly, Kirsten opened fire at her point blank once she had been distracted. Arcee stumbled back upon the blasts and then rolled and opened fire on Kirsten. Soundwave detached Laserbeak for help, where was that delayed ground bridge? Optimus caught Soundwave by surprise after re-aiming at Arcee, which gave him a clear opportunity to charge and he sliced clean through one of his tentacles.

Soundwave flinched in pain but managed to arrange himself to the side of Optimus and pick up the cut tentacle and fire with the other. Energon leaked from the cut one, leaving small puddles of glowing liquid in the sand.

Arcee's intention was not to fight Kirsten to the death, but to at least get her to come with them. But if they couldn't stave off Soundwave and Steve, they wouldn't be able to. Arcee ducked at Kirsten's shots and yelled at Optimus.

"Plan B Optimus!" Arcee shouted. The first plan didn't work, Arcee had tried her best at talking to Kirsten before fighting, remembering Optimus's vow to help any human in need, and she was in desperate need of help. Unfortunately, she didn't seem like she wanted it. Plan B was to try to gather information about the rumored alliances with different countries.

Optimus glared at Soundwave, who had just caught sight of their ground bridge opening to the South.

"What are your plans with the humans?!" Optimus yelled at him. He didn't expect an answer from Soundwave, but he wanted him to know that they could see what they were up to.

"Megatron has never had any interest in doing things the peaceful way, why now?" Optimus continued, forcing the words upon Soundwave, who was quickly trying to pull together Steve and Kirsten to go through the ground bridge. Steve was in vehicle mode with Bumblebee and Smokescreen in fast pursuit from the east. Luckily, he smashed through Arcee and Optimus, running over feet and then shot into the ground bridge. Soundwave had been extending his uninjured tentacle toward Kirsten as he was addressing Optimus face to face and he immediately wrapped it around her legs and pulled her behind him. Arcee and Optimus shot quickly at them both as he started to move. Soundwave blocked most of the shots with his winged arms, backing into the ground bridge just in time for it to close.

"Optimus, we could have fought harder!" Arcee complained.

"I know, Arcee, but fighting wasn't the point of this interrogation," the always calm and reserved Optimus said. Arcee sighed by him as they patched a link to Ratchet for a ground bridge of their own.

"Did you get a sample?" Optimus asked Arcee. A device that Ratchet had given her still was in her hand, she had been expecting to at least get an alloy sample of the mock Cybertronian body, but Soundwave had hit her arm away just in time.

"No.." Arcee said, sounding very disappointed in herself.

"Next time then." Optimus said to her, "What about the meetings?"

Arcee knew she could have worked better in the allotted time, but she had gotten no information, Kirsten didn't speak up about anything. "No..." she said to Optimus, "Nothing."

"Then I will suggest we take a new approach to the gathering of information from our enemies. Something that may have to be more drastic." Optimus replied, their shadows stepped through the light of the ground bridge and then disappeared.

* * *

_Back on the Nemesis.._

"Hahahah, I love the fact that the Autobots want to be keen on our plans, it means that they're scared." Megatron chuckled to the three Decepticons that returned from Africa. After Soundwave had kneeled before Megatron, he showed him how Optimus and company literally swarmed their practice session.

"Hmm, and what to you think they expected that we'd give them?" Megatron asked rhetorically, looking down at the floor and then up again at his loyal Soundwave.

Soundwave turned his head towards Kirsten at the gaze, depicting on his visor the chemical make-up of the metal alloy that made up her body, and also depicting Arcee's non-combative diplomacy.

"Really?" Megatron pondered, "Interesting, Kirsten, tell me, what did she want to know?"

"Well, she asked me to confirm my identity, told me that they knew who I was." Kirsten said bluntly, "And then..." Kirsten continued softly, "Then... she told me that I had joined the wrong side." she looked into his examining optics, remembering her position, "...my lord." she finished off.

"How underhanded of them..." Megatron continued for her. "They have no place to interfere with our own private arrangements. They will no doubt try to block all of our attempts of negotiation if they should become wise to our proceedings." Megatron smiled menacingly and began to grit his metal teeth, "I have a mission for the both of you."

Soundwave stood tall to take his master's orders, Kirsten followed suit with whatever Soundwave did.

"Arcee may have been correct because I **despise** all the humans and their self-righteous attitudes," he took a quick glance at Kirsten, who held her head tall still, not flinching at his words, "It doesn't change the fact that we're fighting a foreign war in their territory, therefore, we must take advantage of any tangible resources that we can get a hold of. I may never like your kind..." Megatron grunted from his vocalizer, "...but I have been left with no choice but to utilize what has been given to me."

Megatron swung his arms and torso around for all of the drones and others who were eavesdropping to hear, "This doesn't mean we stoop to the Autobot's level!" Megatron stuck out his chest, scanning his troopers and drones and workers. His optics were burning with fierceness and deep thought. He faced Soundwave again, "We are still most superior! We are resourceful!"

Kirsten listened to the hum of worshiping Decepticons in the bridge area, she'd never heard anything like it. The repetitious 'all hail Megatron and the Decepticons' was heard from every angle of the large room, on every floor, and every corner. Her optics wandered the walls and the other levels of the room, watching the drones lifting their arms to their lord, to their leader. Soundwave did not, and so she did not either. They were on a different level. Some different facet of cognitive being than the drones below them, and she was glad of it.

"Soundwave," Megatron said, his voice returning to a low level again, "I had told you to ignore a small insignificant piece of information from the Iacon database..."

Soundwave nodded to Megatron and connected to the database remotely, showing him the very bit of information that he was talking about, the one regarding the classification of mineral deposits in the areas of the relics.

"I want you to oversee the gathering of some ore in the area where the Star Sabre was found."

Soundwave rolled his optics behind his visor and nodded. He hated these kind of missions. They were painfully boring, especially when his master had some kind of plan that he didn't know about yet. The only thing that he could speculate was that the iron ore in the area had been charged somehow. When they had gone to fetch the relic, they had ignored the rock completely.

"And you," Megatron turned to Kirsten, "If there is any conflict with humans, I expect you to take care of it. We don't need the Autobots being called in to take care of something we could have prevented in the first place."

Kirsten nodded, understanding her role a little better every passing day. One was to avoid interruption from human groups, whether it be government or not. And the other was to create an air of anti-threatening behavior with the humans so that they did not call on their allied Autobots to aid them in the riddance of the Decepticon presence. Kirsten wasn't blind to the fact that the Autobots had already secured their place as human allies and the Decepticons had not.

Perhaps that yes, she did join the wrong side, but it's not like she had any other choice and now she had to make do with the choices. It's not like she didn't have anything to gain, and it's not like she hadn't considered the betrayal to her own species for a slight taste of power. It was the safest decision, and that's how she had justified it. Maybe with a little luck, she could redefine the Decepticon's reputation with the humans from dangerous, to, well, at least neutral. She wasn't going to bet on peaceful just yet.

Soundwave turned to face her one Megatron had dismissed himself. Maybe boring missions like these wouldn't be as boring now that he had Kirsten by his side to keep the humans in order. Smirking behind his mask, he thought to himself, efficient, he liked it. But of course he liked it, it was all his idea in the first place.

Kirsten noticed him looking her way and she acknowledged him with wide optics. He reached for the wing protrusions from her back and displayed on his visor the amount of time they have had to mature.

His sharp fingers traced the edges lightly, and he could see the small plates and layers that made them whole. When it was time to transform, those plates would reform to the wing shape necessary, providing that it did not deviate too far from the intended Cybertronian aircraft. Something agile... something small...he knew exactly where to take her to scan a proper jet form. It was time for her to learn how to fly.

Kirsten leaned forward to him, "You should reattach this first..." she said tapping on the severed tentacle in his grasp.

Soundwave looked down at his forgotten tentacle. Yes, that would be useful.

* * *

_At Autobot base..._

"I cannot believe that Megatron would turn over a new leaf and began interaction with human inhabitants in a non-suspicious way." Optimus told Agent Fowler over the video feed. "The people of the earth will soon view them as not our enemies, but our neutrals, and that would not be an optimal way to proceed."

"But Prime, they haven't wreaked any havoc, they haven't released any bombs! If the pentagon doesn't classify their behavior as wreckless and an endangerment of humanity, I can't send out our resources **just** to spy on them. That should be your job if that's what you want." Fowler said, scowling at Optimus.

Optimus Prime had a lot to think about. What happens when your enemy suddenly doesn't act like one anymore? It was suspicious and Megatron's quest for power had never ended with peace. It had just never ended.

* * *

After some small surgery, Soundwave had bridged himself and Kirsten to an airfield in Canada, where he had seen some of these fighter jets in action, performing in a show. Just out of the main city of Vancouver, they watched the airbase from a distance and he pointed to a row of jets.

Kirsten was nervous. She was nervous enough flying as it was, but to actually be the one flying made her even more anxious. But then, she'd been through much more nerve-wracking things lately, she thought. She could do this. Scanning the base's collection of jets that relatively looked the same, her optics rested on a CF-18 Hornet, it looked pretty cool.

"That one." she said, pointing in its direction. "Will it work?"

Soundwave scanned the jet and compared it to her mass and shape, yes, it would. He showed her the statistics on his visor and the scanning technique. She showed a depiction of her, and a mass of energy building up from her abdomen and then transferring the energy to her optics, statically connecting with her processor and then transferring the information into the rest of her body via the charged energon.

Kirsten nodded, not wanting him to know that she had no idea how to do all of that. Soundwave nudged her shoulder and showed her to slow her energon pulse, relax. She vented a few times before trying to concentrated on the jet. Imagining holding her breath, she stared at it for a long time, not seeming to be doing anything. She changed her stance and tried again. She tried lowering her head, tapping her belly, and then she held her hand on the top of her head. Relax, she reminded herself.

She closed her optics and focused. Habitually licking her lips, she opened her optics slowly and just relaxed, knowing what she needed to do, and just let her body do it for her. She felt the energy swell up in her abdomen and the warmth suddenly transferred to her head. Her eyes flashed green for a split second and then she felt a queasy feeling where her stomach used to be. She shivered and felt prickles all over her body, feeling the smaller plates of her body re-conform to the structure necessary to take the proper shape. Her wings changed a little, and her legs changed a little aesthetically, but the surface feeling was nothing like what was going on inside of her.

Soundwave knew the feeling, all Cybertronians experienced it for the first time. The redistribution of the body's transformation mechanisms and the change that happened. The first time was always the hardest and the most uncomfortable. Kirsten finally felt the feelings go away and somehow, she felt refreshed, and kind of antsy. Her body chemistry was telling her that she needed to fly. She felt like millions of small electrical bugs were crawling around in her body, and it itched. Soundwave wrapped a long arm around her waist and pulled her against him, roughly. He remembered his first transformation, a coming of age in the Cybertronian world, and a magnificent feeling. He wished he could feel what she was feeling, but instead, he grabbed a greater hold of her waist, and flung her in the air.

Kirsten gasped breathlessly as Soundwave threw her body up into the atmosphere without warning.

"Shit!" she cursed impulsively. Thankfully, her body knew what to do before she did. It was the strangest feeling, Kirsten thought, as if she was suddenly a contortionist acrobat, feeling her body transform and reassemble itself into flying mode. Her arms whipped around, her legs tucked and the wings on her back spread almost automatically. She felt heat and thrust from the bottom of her feet and suddenly, she was flying over the ocean at a dramatic speed.

It was amazing. In just a few seconds, she had gone from the ground to flight. 'Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh' rolled through her head over and over again as the propulsion shot her into the infinite reaches of the atmosphere, it was an exhilarating feeling and she almost thought she was about to pass out from her euphoria.

Soundwave appeared beside her, stealth and silent in his drone mode. She was caught off-guard at first, but then she soon realized that it was him, the indigo lines on his wings giving him away. He veered left to go south. Kirsten followed him, leaning into the air, turning herself to follow. She wavered slightly, but then caught herself again, feeling how nimble her wingtips were when she sliced through the wind and air. It was... almost like surfing, but not quite. She leaned into her turns, just like on the water, and she balanced herself fore and aft to dive and to curve upwards, just like on the water.

She followed Soundwave for miles and miles across endless ocean. He guided her through turns and loops and took her up and then down. She was a fast learner, never ceasing to amaze him. He felt proud of himself, as if she was his accomplishment. He could have sufficed as leader of the Decepticons because he knew how to be inventive, but he was content enough in his role below Megatron. He liked the fact that there wasn't someone continuously trying to overpower him. A small drawback of being leader.

Soundwave boosted his thrusters and increased his speed, leaving Kirsten behind to catch up. Kirsten summoned the energy inside her and felt her speed increase. She wavered again but focused on the straight line to Soundwave ahead of her, she could see the line of steam he had left behind from heating the water vapor in the air. She followed the line of steam downward though he was but a small dot to her now and it led her to the water. She was approaching a small pacific island, perhaps it was part of the Hawaiian chain, and she finally saw his form swing upward suddenly and transform back into his natural body in a beautifully controlled and graceful manner.

Kirsten tried to slow her thrusters as much as she could, and as she approached the island, she tried to mimic Soundwave's moves and swing upward to transform back into her original state but as soon as she lifted herself, she stopped her thrusters completely which gave her little time to transform before her feet touched down. Her legs extended and her arms flew up as she came into contact with the ground and stumbled around a few steps until she had regained her balance.

Soundwave admired her as she snickered at her landing and then clasped her face with her hands, an amazed look taking over her expression. He had never seen her look so happy or so overwhelmed with a sense of accomplishment before now and he was glad to be the one to introduce it to her. The feeling of her flying by his side had left him with a strong sensation in his chest. He hoped that she would never lose her human characteristics, the small giggles, the bewilderment she found in even the smallest thing he showed her. Flying was just an integral part of their past but an entirely new frontier to her. He received abundant satisfaction from her small reactions.

The challenge he would have to face in the future, was to keep amazing her with new things. He never wanting that feeling to go away. Like time and time before he had noticed himself fleeting work on the bridge only to retreat to his workroom so that she could be his company. He liked the company, the companionship.

"Soundwave, look!" she whispered and pointed in the distance. Soundwave looked to where she was indicating and saw a glimpse of a large fish's flukes just crest above the surface of the water and then dive under. Based on the size of the flukes, Soundwave estimated for the size of the fish to be about 30 meters(98 feet) in length. No, that couldn't be right, could it?

Kirsten had seen whales before, but never a blue whale. She kept her eyes peeled on the water for another sign of its location.

Soundwave was confused. Something existed on this planet that dwarfed their size? Please. But Kirsten was so engrossed in the animal that he had to wonder, were his calculations correct? They had time, and he enjoyed logging new information, so Soundwave transformed and flew cautiously across the water, making a quick loop back to make sure Kirsten knew that she should follow.

Kirsten felt the energy of transforming flow through her. She tucked her legs and felt the thrusters began and then she tucked her arms and flew steadily out to Soundwave. They flew slowly together, circling the ocean for signs of the whales. Soundwave had never tried to track an animal like this before, none of his sensors could pick up any sort of beacon. He shifted to a mass sensor, seeing if he could track the animal by its volume. Oh, and could he! He located it just north of where they were. The volume of this beast was huge even compared to him and Megatron. Soundwave guided Kirsten in the proper direction and she saw the blowhole of the whale surface. It shot a geyser into the air just as Soundwave and Kirsten flew through it. This time, Kirsten had amazed Soundwave, little had he known there was beasts this large on this planet.

"It's a blue whale." Kirsten said to Soundwave in a muffled voice as they passed over.

Soundwave noticed that it was easily 4x his size, a great creature indeed. They circled back around to take another look. The whale seemed to have noticed their presence and rolled underneath the surface of the water, diving and exposing his flukes again.

"More over there!" Kirsten said suddenly, noticing that way off in the distance was a series of blows. They flew to investigate. Three smaller whales were swimming together, much to her appreciation. But the misty waters soon gave way to truth. One of the whales was a boat, a whaling boat.

Soundwave noticed that she wasn't following him anymore as he swung out over the ocean and made a loop back. She was circling around the area with the smaller whales.

Kirsten hated whalers. There was no need to kill the large beasts for food, there was enough of it on land. She wondered if there was anything she could do. Her large, vulturous circles drew attention from the whaling boat. The crew began to scramble, thinking that she was a government fighter jet there to take them out since commercial whaling was illegal. Soundwave joined her circles alongside her, he quickly figured out the situation. He noticed the large hooks, the washed out blood stains on the ship, and the monumental sized cranes hanging over the decks. He detached Laserbeak from his form and she circled along side them too. He challenged himself to trust Kirsten in her choice of making an enemy, which is what he predicted this situation would produce. Wishing he could ask her if this was a wise decision as they circled wide overhead, the boat's crew made the decision for them by opening fire.


	28. Operation Earth

**A-N: I am so sorry for the long wait, busy busy busy. Excuses aside, I am proud to say that my goal is to finish this in ten chapters or less! Thanks for being patient and OH I have some news! I have re-done the story in ways that some of you won't like. I wanted to make it a proper romance and not smut, so instead of graphic scenes, I have taken all those away and edited the story so it has virtually none of that, and more sweet moments, less physical. But I like physical too but like I've said before, this story is WAY different than I had ever planned on it being. It will still be Soundwave/Kirsten-centric but with a greater goal in mind. Critique encouraged and comments, favs everything appreciated! :) ~K**

Ch 28

Soundwave's immediate reaction to being fired at was to fire back. They had gotten themselves into an unintentional mess. Soundwave led their brigade around again and wondered how Kirsten would handle the human situation. In one direction, they could be severing potential ties with the country that this ship belonged to, and give the Autobots a reason to not trust them. In the other direction, which was safest, was to leave the area and forget that they were ever seen. Unfortunately, that wasn't the most exciting route...

Kirsten looked for a flag, but there was none. The small bullets from their guns rarely ever hit Kirsten or Soundwave, but she would notice when they did hit her. They felt like water droplets did on her skin, but little to no damage occurred. Soundwave finally made a move, he sent Laserbeak down swiftly, and she fired her cannons at the lower part of the crane, making it come down, hard. Is this what Kirsten wanted? He waited for her to respond.

Kirsten saw Laserbeak attack the ship, but not the people. It seemed like a good way to handle the situation. 'Alright' she thought, she tried to speak so that he could hear her, if that was possible through two loud engines and the force of the wind being used against her.

"This is off the records, right!" She said, and then dove in, trying to locate her arm cannons and fire them while in flight, which wasn't as easy as she thought. Soundwave followed her, assuming the hybrid wanted to sink the ship. Kirsten fired a few shots but her aim was off. Soundwave followed her through another loop and she tried again, firing near the ship's engine compartment and pipes.

Soundwave noticed her not trying to kill the humans themselves, what was the point of that, he wondered. Soundwave didn't want to take too much time out of their day to accomplish this, so he scanned the ship, located the boiler room, and sent a large cannon shot towards that and the ship's rudder. The ship slowly began shifting to the side and the crew on board began to detach the lifeboats.

"Take that!" Kirsten said under the winds whipping around her form.

Soundwave and Kirsten flew to a nearby island and landed. From the beaches, they could watch the boat sink and the string of lifeboats start floating along in the smooth ocean.

From her side, Soundwave made a few strange mechanical pings and questioned her motives with a diagram of the ship. It's not that he didn't approve of the situation, he just wondered what bounties it would produce and if it was worthwhile to the Decepticon cause.

"Well..." Kirsten looked ashamed at the sandy beach, "No...it wasn't for the Decepticon cause, I was selfish."

Soundwave nodded at her admittance and placed a large hand on her shoulder and shook a finger side to side in front of her optics. Soundwave didn't want her to do anything like that again, even if it was for the 'good' of the whales, whom he found intriguing too, there was nothing to gain from that kind of interaction.

Kirsten felt hurt, she didn't want to upset Soundwave but she wanted to do what she felt right in her heart. Being scolded by him was by far the worst thing she could have received. Her dismay was interrupted suddenly though by a foreign voice from in the palmy woods behind them.

"We are in debt to you!" The gruff voice said. Soundwave and Kirsten both turned around at the person standing in a close distance from them. He was a squatty dark-skinned man with a pleasant face and flowered shirt. The fisherman's pants he wore were stained with colors and dirt and he wore a decade old pair of sandals.

Kirsten looked through her optics at the man and then she looked at Soundwave, who gave her a small shove forward as if saying, deal with the human. Kirsten leaned over with Soundwave's shove and kneeled to the man to talk to him closer.

"Who are you?" she said to him.

"Titi Tong. I-Kiribati and ambassador consultant, also, fisherman." The man burst out in laughter at his small joke, Kirsten didn't really get it, "You sank the whale ship! We have been trying to get rid of that menace for years! We are in debt to you." Titi said again and held out his hand generously.

"What island is this?" Kirsten asked before accepting his hand.

"Kiribati! No visitors here, not many ships or planes come. We are small people, very nice!" He smiled a full tooth grin.

"And you speak very good english." Kirsten said to him.

"I speak english!? **YOU** speak english!" Titi said, as if she should know that they were the most odd creatures to be speaking an earthian language.

Kirsten laughed and then smiled as Titi explained the small history of Kiribati and it's cohabitation of the British and Americans, and its independence in the 1970's.

"What can you offer us, Titi?" Kirsten asked, "We can save your protected whales but, what does your small island have to offer?" Kirsten didn't feel comfortable asking for payment for destroying the whaling ship but Soundwave was with her so she had to be stern.

"I may have something..." he leaned in closer as if trying to whisper, "that belongs to you...come follow me!" Titi exclaimed as he trudged back into the palm tree forest towards town.

Kirsten followed without looking at Soundwave, trying to show him that she knew exactly what she was doing. Titi drove in an old 1940's Willis jeep towards a hangar, which also looked old and dilapidated. He parked wherever he pleased and hopped out.

"The president keeps a secret in here, no one allowed but me, and him." he acknowledged a stray dog walking past. The 'lock' he undid was just a rope tied in knots, and he opened up the small door and then opened up the larger hangar door for them. They walked inside, Soundwave was almost tall enough to hit his head on the roof.

"This.." Titi said as he uncovered a dusty old blanket from a box that glowed with energy. "We don't know what this is or what to do with it, do you know?" Titi asked.

Soundwave leaned in and scanned the box. It wasn't a relic, not an egg-shaped container but this was definitely Cybertronian in origin. Soundwave completed the scan and found that the contents of the box were actually the box itself. It was a large-capacity storage container for pressurized energon, it would hold the same capacity of 100 large energon cubes would, ideal for traveling or a small pod. Soundwave nodded at it and turned to Kirsten to show her what it was.

"Cool." she exclaimed, "We can use this!" She smiled at Titi and held her hand out to accept his. They exchanged a handshake and he clapped his hands together.

"I read about you in the news! I am happy to be friends with your kind!" Titi reached into his pocket and held a small business card out to her, it was sea-salt stained and the ink had bled a little. "You contact me if you need anything!"

"I'll be in contact, Titi. Have you found more of these?"

Titi thought for a moment and then his eyes widened. "In the sea! We find big, glowing objects by the volcano. But no one goes near!" Titi shook his head and held out his hands.

Soundwave's visor displayed the heat tolerances of the average Cybertronian body, showing that they could withstand the heat to find the objects. If his scans didn't pick them up before, the heat was probably to blame.

"You go? I tell you, but maybe I ask favor before I tell you?" Titi said.

"Of course."

"We have shipment of trash container but no ships come to get it! Kiribati is filled with trash! Please help us get it off our island." Titi said remorsefully. It was true, when Kirsten and Soundwave landed on the island, the beaches were scattered with litter and the road to the hangar was lined with bags and bags of plastic bottles.

Before Kirsten could answer, Soundwave nodded to him, accepting the agreement.

"Yes." she said, happy to know that Soundwave consented to the arrangement.

Soundwave checked in with Megatron before continuing their time on Kiribati, notifying him of their status.

Titi took them to the center of town to the President's house where they met the President of Kiribati. They organized a town-wide effort to collect the trash and litter scattered among the sandy roads and once it was collected into one spot, Kirsten would return to gather it and take it somewhere else. In the meanwhile, the I-Kiribati gave Soundwave the coordinates as to where the underwater volcano was, where divers had located some glowing items that looked alien in origin.

Soundwave felt guilty for doubting Kirsten after it was all done. Never had the Decepticons acted in such a way where they were neither threatened or needed to threaten someone or something to get what they want. Kirsten had seemed to accomplish the same thing that war had done for them, with just a smile.

They both groundbridged back to the Nemesis, with a high-volume energon container in tow and new coordinates for other cybertronian items to be found, but not before the Kiribati invited them to share in a feast and dance for helping them clean up their island.

* * *

Megatron began debriefing then immediately wondering why such mundane payments such as hauling trash around was worth the coordinates.

He roared in frustration, "Don't you see how low we are stooping to acquire such knowledge!?" He said to both Soundwave and Kirsten after their return. "Garbage!? Garbage!" Megatron stomped his foot so aggressively it seemed as though the entire floating ship rattled.

Soundwave stepped forward in defense of Kirsten's decision.

"Soundwave, enough! Don't you see what we've become!? We've become the Autobots!" Megatron shook his fist violently towards Soundwave, angry that he would defend Kirsten's decision.

Soundwave knew he wouldn't be able to convince Megatron otherwise. He was too focused on his reputation. Unless he could convince Megatron that the more countries that were on board with the Decepticons, the less they would side with the Autobots.

"We don't need the earthian's help!" Megatron said when Soundwave introduced the idea, "We just need their cooperation!"

"And we are getting cooperation!" Kirsten said to defend Soundwave.

Megatron's energon boiled when she interrupted him and his reflexes couldn't be stopped. How dare she speak over him. Megatron swiftly raised his large arm and smacked the side of her head with his sharp hand, sending her to the ground and sliding across the slick floor.

Soundwave's reaction was thwarted by Megatron turning his head to him and growling menacingly, stopping him from coming to her aid. Soundwave flinched but didn't move, regretfully. Soundwave knew his mistake immediately, regarding his new companion high enough to interfere with his regards to Megatron. Megatron was to always be the highest, no matter what, and so he lowered his knee to his master yet again, asking forgiveness with his bowed head.

Kirsten sat up and rubbed at her face with her hand, watching Soundwave submit to Megatron in attempts to keep face. She felt sorry for him, Megatron had full control over Soundwave and there was nothing that he could do about it, even if they were right.

Megatron snarled to his officer and released a grunt in his direction before turning silently around and walking to his own quarters. Once Megatron had left the room, Soundwave got to his feet and walked slowly over to Kirsten as she got to her feet as well.

Soundwave displayed to her the hierarchy of the ship, reminding her that Megatron was always, and foremost, in charge, of everything. But he wanted her to know that she shouldn't feel guilty, that she shouldn't feel as though she had done anything wrong, and that the Decepticon cause had still been a successful outcome from their adventure. He lifted a bladed arm and touched her cheek plate where Megatron had slapped her. She grabbed it, disgruntled and shoved it away from her face.

"It's fine...it's all fine..." she said with indifference and began pacing the bridge to her favorite computer, where she would continue accessing documents that Soundwave had intercepted from world governments.

How was she supposed to get across the barriers of communication through to Megatron that her way was the best way, or so she thought. Even Soundwave had seen the immediate effects from doing something selfless and random. They had accomplished finding more cybertronian property hadn't they? She stared at the keyboard in front of her, not feeling like typing anything, thinking, wondering, how the future was to treat her.

Soundwave, angered by both Megatron's and Kirsten's current moods, quickly instructed to Dreadwing that he should oversee the diving expedition at the provided coordiantes in the Pacific. He was furious that it had come to this, which he had dreaded all along. Megatron unfortunately was never on his same wavelength, and while Kirsten was, she wasn't the one to answer to, so if Megatron refuted his plans, then what next? He had thought the plan was a good idea. He had started to see that they didn't need to make friends or enemies with the humans, they could just be acquaintances, but Megatron saw it differently, the way Soundwave used to see it, before Kirsten.

They didn't need to assume power over humans, it was already widely accepted as a fact. He glanced Kirsten's way before continuing into the corridors of the ship wishing there was something he could do to ease her mind, but at the same time, wishing he didn't have to choose between the two of them, but he continued on, ready to tell Megatron what he thought of his outburst, and ready to get reprimanded for it. Before he could do that though, he suddenly caught a signal from the Autobot's base to the US Government, and intercepted it.

* * *

Megatron stood alone in one of the bare lounge rooms of the ship, thinking. He stared out of one of the small port holes in the ship and reminisced. An angular shadow fell on him from behind, and he knew who it was.

"Soundwave...if you are here to argue, don't." Megatron said softly to his officer.

Soundwave didn't kneel at his master's words, he walked into the room with him and stood beside him. They stood motionless for a long moment before one of them moved. The respect and history that they shared canceled all anger between them and turned the tension into thought provoking problem solving.

"Soundwave, I fought for you. I care not that she has become your companion." Megatron closed his eyes and lowered his head in deep contemplation. "It's just...It is hard to come to terms with, the fact that this, is our future." He opened his deep red eyes, just enough to make his brow plates glow in the dark room. "It is hard for me to accept our fate as such...as hybrids, as anything less than what we have built, that which has made us so powerful." His words were low and full of weight. "It makes me look like a fool. It makes my decisions more complicated, and it makes me regret."

Soundwave, taken aback by his sudden pouring out of emotions, listened quietly, setting aside his own feelings from the earlier outburst to listen to what Megatron had to say.

"I regret." Megatorn repeated. "Had my greed been so that I had blinded myself to the more fortuitous tasks such as this?"

Soundwave actually felt for his master, he deepened his head beside him, lowering his guard, feeling his spark in the room pulse with great energy.

"What army do I command, if I have no army?" Megatron said lowly. "Who do I rule over, if there is no one to be ruled?" His face was indifferent, thoughtful. Megatron turned his head to the side, looking to Soundwave for support and advice. "Have I kept the Decepticon's greater interests in mind...or my own?"

Soundwave was silent to the question, though he knew the answer, but it was a dilemma of whether he should tell him or not. The silence spoke for itself and Megatron sighed, closing his eyes again.

Soundwave finally responded, only by connecting to his signal and representing it on his visor. Megatron looked at his own signal in Soundwave's visor, yes, it had been only him.

"True. I want to rule, Soundwave." Megatron said to him. "I want to win, I want to be, I want the universe. Is that too much to ask..." Megatron said, sneering as he did so. "And if I cannot rule my own kind, then I want to be god among another." His voice got louder the more he spoke. "My purpose...is mute otherwise."

Soundwave nodded at him, knowing that this was as close to an apology that he was going to get.

"You do what you need to, Soundwave, as long as you always represent me."

They shared an unsaid acknowledgment of respect between them for a moment before Soundwave moved on, showing Megatron the intercepted energy from the Autobots to the US Government.

"Hmmm, it seems that the Autobots are bored without having to protect the stupid humans from us. So bored, it seems, that they are willing to offer their services to regain trust among the humans who have delt with Kirsten, how pathetic." He began to pace, "Don't make me regret saying this." Megatron said to Soundwave, "But keep doing what you're doing...it seems like the only way to make the Autobots fall. And then I will have won."

Soundwave nodded at his master and displayed his and Kirsten's next meetings in the world, enough to keep them busy for a good month. Soundwave's plan by then, would be to lock in trust from the humans to the Decepticons so that the Autobots would have no one left to defend, and then, they would have no reason not to join Megatron's army.

The goal now, was to rule Earth, and Soundwave had already been planning ahead.


	29. Stronger

**a/n: (spoilers in a/n) Sorry for the long wait! Seems to be a recurrence. I want to finish this story before Season 3 gets too involved! Remember I started this in the middle of Season 2 so Dreadwing is still alive and Starscream hasn't come back yet so, that's where my characters still are. I'm being careful about this...something needed to be done about this darn writers block to finish this off and I think I've got it. Hopefully..comments, concerns, questions, anything much appreciated even though I'll do my own thing anyway, it's always nice to hear from you all! Thanks for all the faves, comments, follows, you guys are the best! HUGS Luv ~K ;P**

Ch 29 Stronger

Soundwave looked in on Kirsten. She wasn't in her allocated room. He had pinged the ship several times trying to locate her position. He began to wonder if she found out a way to disengage her locator beacon. He tapped into his energy reserves and went outside the ship to ping. There she was. What was she doing outside. Soundwave made his way out to her so that he could...well...he didn't know, but he felt like finding her. When he reached the ship's deck, he looked into the sky to find her before tapping into the beacon again as it took too much energy at the moment to waste using it, he needed a recharge.

From a distance, Soundwave caught a shiny glimpse of a jet creating loops in the air. Practicing? He wondered. He waited patiently on the deck until she returned.

Kirsten was practicing her flying skills. Knock Out said she'd be an agile flyer, so she wanted to see just how agile she could be. Catching the sight of Soundwave on the deck of the ship waiting for her though, cut her practice short. Kirsten headed back to the ship's surface and transformed to walk over to him. Getting better at landing, she only stumbled minorly this time.

Soundwave enjoyed watching her walk, it was sultry and feminine. Her hips moved from one side to the other, and her shoulders opposed her hips. He stared at her face as she dusted herself off with downcast eyes running over her arms and then she leaned her head back to stretch out her neck and spine. It got easier, the transformation, but it was still rough on the joints. When she was finally in front of Soundwave, she looked up at him and stopped walking.

"Yes?" she asked him.

Soundwave displayed the time frame of their trip to Arizona to start the mining around where the Star Sabre was found.

"Now?" She asked.

Soundwave shook his head. Kirsten nodded in response and waited for something else. Soundwave wanted to tell her so much, but he couldn't say those things. She was looking right at him with her inquisitive eyes and patient gaze. How did she make it so hard for him to communicate with her when she made it so easy. His thoughts were jumping ahead of himself, he wanted to build an empire with her. But how could he start small when his plans were already so big?

Kirsten looked around and then diverted her eyes to the deck of the ship, wondering about the awkward silence between them. She wanted some sort of an apology or some kind of reassurance that Megatron didn't think her a nuisance. Surprisingly though, she didn't expect to get one, but it didn't satisfy the fact that she still wanted it. She had changed her life permanently and no amount of metal or energon or alien immunity would stop her from thinking like a human. He stood over her like a tall, dark shadow, different than before she had undergone the transformation. The pressure to please was higher, and the stress had mounted faster than she could have comprehended.

Soundwave reached for her chest, hovering a hand over her spark chamber where the pulse of her body lived. He mimicked the pulse in his visor, lighting up the dark smooth glass with every beat and feeling it get faster. Kirsten sometimes still didn't know what he wanted because he could and probably would never speak a word to her. She acted on her emotions and began to furrow her face in stressful tension while Soundwave reached for her cheek, the one Megatron had hit, and she fell into his arms.

"I'm sorry.." she said into his chest. "It's hard. It's really hard." She covered her face with her hands and kept whispering, "I'm sorry.." over and over again.

Soundwave held her against his rigid chest, careful not to disturb her. He hadn't really done anything comforting like this before, but he decided it would be best to at least try his hand at it. It was just the nature of the universe that the conceptive genders tended to be more fragile. But he enjoyed her needing him. He enjoyed being wanted. If he were to screw up on the Decepticon ship, he would be replaced. But if he were to screw up with Kirsten, the emotional bond that she had with him would at least help in re-adhering their relationship.

Soundwave couldn't help but be aroused by her closeness and his hand cupping her shoulder, slowly started to make its way down the crevice of her back and resting just above her glute plates. Kirsten mimicked, whether conscious or not, his body language and snaked a hand around the crevices of his chest plates, dipping her head into the warm temperature of his core and gliding her cheek gracefully against his indigo lines. He was indeed blessed with the gift of Kirsten to relax his tense mind and body. Ponderings were shoved aside and Soundwave's processor began to trace the quickest path to the nearest vacant lockable room on the ship.

* * *

Later in the day, Soundwave, Kirsten and few miners were to bridge to the rocky plains of northern Arizona where they were to start harvesting the tainted metal that rested deep within the mountains. The metal ore with indigenous and respective Cybertronian fusion from the radiation emitted from the Star Sabre. Kirsten vaguely remembered Megatron mentioning this mission a long time ago, and now it was about to take place. There was only one major problem that she faced. The mining area was deep inside of a sacred Navajo reservation.

"Soundwave, show me the coordinates on screen." Megatron commanded.

Soundwave brought up the location, desert lands bordered by rocky mountains and the occasional dotting of clumps of brush.

"What a barren yet rich wasteland." Megatron growled, "Kirsten, I will need you to be at your best, for this task, will be the answer to whether or not we will survive on this planet with these means." Megatron lowered his head. His words were meant to be serious, for if they had found the source of not only energon, but a renewable metal source that resembled their own biochemistry, then all disputes with the Autobots were sure to be distinguished.

"You said before that this will be a challenging task. What did you mean by that?" Megatron asked Kirsten.

"Lord Megatron, the Navajo people precede the modern continent of people, they have the utmost respect and peace for their mother earth and to have it disturbed, will have to be one hell of a negotiation." she said with a slight tremor.

"Then I suggest you summon your power from this hell you speak of." Megatron replied and then turned to Soundwave. "Let's go."

Megatron went just to oversee the process of what Soundwave and Kirsten had been up to in the past. Kirsten briefed him slightly on how the Navajo Indian reservations came about, why they did, and why this situation should be handled delicately because of the Navajo's belief that all earth is sacred earth and it belongs to no one. The nation had been contacted already to let them know that the Decepticons were coming, and they were waiting, in numbers, and in protest.

When the Decepticons arrived on the ground, protesters from the Navajo nation, even outside of the nation corralled in the street in front of the Council Chamber, the members peacefully stood on the steps leading to the Chamber.

"If I see any of you reaching for a weapon without my permission, I'll see to it that Knock Out puts his new laser cutter to use." Megatron barked at his miners behind him as him, Kirsten and Soundwave stepped mindfully towards the president and his council members.

"Lord Megatron." The president greeted. Megatron was surprised by his addressing him as 'Lord', as was the crowd and Soundwave. Kirsten had mentioned it in an email before this day.

Megatron lifted an eyebrow plate her way before reciprocating the greeting.

"President Sully." Kirsten whispered as softly as she could out of the side of her mouth.

"President Sully." Megatron boomed with a powerful voice that sent the crowds scattering to the sidewalks and out of the street. "..my ambassador, Kirsten, and my intelligence commander, Soundwave." he introduced his crew. Both Kirsten and Soundwave nodded their heads when they were respectfully introduced.

They all made their way to the rear of the building where the people screaming in the streets couldn't reach or hear them, they were surrounded by a 10 foot high wall which the Decepticons easily stepped over, and met with the Council.

"Well let me start with, I am not happy about this, not one bit, and I don't plan on letting you desecrate our land unless you can convince me that whatever you will do, will be beneficial to our planet." The president started out with.

Megatron growled inside. Kirsten heard him and gingerly touched his large arm.

"President Sully, I'm sure our presence here is not favorable to any of us, but you may be the only one who may know of what the Decepticons, what the Cybertronians you house here on this earth have gone through." Kirsten began to say before Megatron had ruined it all with a retort full of anger.

"What exactly do you mean?" President Sully asked. He leaned back in his lawn chair and placed his hands interlocked on his growing belly.

"I speak for all Decepticons, our people have been forced from what we call home, misguided into thinking that we are somehow to blame for our planet's demise, when in fact it was both parties who caused the destruction of the land where they once walked." she turned and held her hand out to where Soundwave and the miners stood.

"You know the feeling of being misplaced, of being forced from your homes and only wanting what a little bit of shelter that the land can offer to you, only to be forced away again. We experience that every day. We are nomads, only looking for a place to call home. Your people and our people are know what value that the word 'home' holds. It is something we have been deprived of for war, we've been scattered because of loss, and we've been guilty of trying to fight for it. My comrades want to stay on earth and to do that and the metal ore that your land holds is tainted with Cybertronian richness. We need to heal, like you, we need to be fixed, like you, but we are running out of resources. Can you help us?" Kirsten finished with an inclination in her voice and a smile on her face.

Megatron was rolling his eyes inside of his mind, sighing a defeat to her petty words, but...if this is what it took...

Soundwave stepped forward and leaned over for the President to see his lit visor. The land they needed was 100 miles from their current location and 30 miles from any inhabitant. Soundwave zoomed in on the mountain where they would start.

"We ask your permission because we want the earth to know that we appreciate what it has given to us." Kirsten started, "and we want to give back. Currently, we are harvesting fruit and tidying the oceans from destructive garbage, wouldn't you want to say that you were involved in one of the biggest earth-saving projects known to mankind?"

The president rocked on the chair's rear two legs and pondered for a bit.

Megatron's head turned toward Kirsten, an inquisitive look overtaking his expression when she caught eyes with him. She trembled inside, she knew Megatron didn't like what she was saying, it was too peaceful for him. She only hoped that Soundwave had talked or, communicated with him the fruit of this type of labor.

"I will grant you permission on one condition." The President finally said. Kirsten listened closely when he motioned for her to come closer. He then changed his mind and scribbled something on a scrap piece of paper he pulled from his pocket and gave it to Kirsten. The Council members turned their heads the opposite way when he did this, as if they'd done this kind of secret exchange before. Kirsten frowned and then looked at the piece of paper as she stood tall again.

The paper read: Kill an ocelot at this location with a weapon I will supply you with.

And then an address followed the short note.

"I want no questions asked. If you proceed with this task, you may have unlimited access to the mountain."

Kirsten nodded and wondered what the significance of the killing was. Underneath her metal skin, she felt fowl play might be a part of it since Ocelot's were an endangered species. Megatron peered at the tiny note below him. Hmm, he thought, finally a human who didn't want their charity work.

"I know what it is like to be misplaced, to be a nomad, to be one who walks the land with no shelter. I pity those who put me in such a position," was all the President said before the Decepticons dismissed themselves and opened up a groundbridge back to the ship.

"We will be in contact." Kirsten said to him before entering the light.

* * *

"So...what does it mean?" Megatron asked Kirsten.

"It must be revenge..." Kirsten said back to him as Soundwave started entering the address into their tracking system. It was a house, on the outskirts of town, but it was unclear who it belonged to.

"Heheh." Megatron chuckled. "Now this is interesting. No banana harvests, no garbage collecting, this, is something that I understand." Megatron looked sinister when he understood the task at hand.

"What do you mean?" Dreadwing asked, having watched their conversation with the Navajo people from the ship as Laserbeak circled, recording the entire transpiration.

"It seems that our negotiation has lead to blackmail." Megatron chuckled.

"But who are we blackmailing..." Kirsten wondered and watched Soundwave search earth records of the address that they were given. A name popped up.

"Tim Bennett...I don't know who that is." Kirsten said, but Soundwave was way ahead of her. He immediately brought up on screen the relationship between the two men and status of each. It seems as though they were cousins, both had Navajo blood but Tim worked as a land developer and was also on city council of the small town he lived in. The house on the outskirts of the Navajo town was a weekend home where he liked to hunt.

"I...don't think we should do this." Kirsten said, feeling a second bad feeling come out from within her. "This seems too pre-meditated..."

Megatron frowned and asked her to explain herself.

"He didn't ask any of his councilmen to leave, they knew that he was going to do this. I bet he had the thought already in his mind that we was going to ask us to do this. Also... didn't you all notice the protesters? No place we have visited has protested so much."

Soundwave nodded and replayed on screen some of Laserbeak's recordings of the crowd.

"Look at all the pro-Autobot signs!" Kirsten exclaimed. Megatron and Soundwave both watched intensely.

"I hate admitting this, but you are right, Kirsten." Megatron spoke. "These people have allied with the Autobots before we met with them. He wanted to trick us into some kind of false crime and make it look like blackmail and then the Autobots would have reason to rally the humans against us. Clever Autobots, but we have our own smart human..." Megatron whispered to himself.

Kirsten blushed at the thought that Megatron had called her smart but she held her smile at bay while Soundwave hacked into the President's computer. Kirsten came to stand beside him and read the screen with him. It seemed as though after her first contact with the President, he had then contacted the US government and the Autobots to see what he should do. Another email had revealed that the Autobots didn't want them engaging with the Decepticons but they needed a reason to interfere, thus, the idea of sending them on a simple mission disguised as blackmail but in reality, would have caused a riot.

"Kirsten. I...trust you to handle this in the best way possible. Having the Autobots involved in this trickery does not make me happy. However, it does make me happy to know that we...have a reason to not trust the Autobots with evidence. Act wisely." Megatron said from over her shoulder.

Soundwave tapped at the keyboard, he already had a plan cooking in his processor. He pieced the bits of information together into one single message and then looked to Kirsten.

"We the humans always thought the Autobots to be the good guys...now it doesn't seem so." Kirsten whispered towards the screen, "It's like a final act of desperation."

Soundwave watched her gears turn in her head, she had noticed the people, she had noticed the things that they did not and had it not have been for her observation, they would be in the midst of blackmailing themselves so that the Autobots had a reason to go after them right now.

"Send it to all the major newstations." Kirsten said. Soundwave hit a button and the message was on its way around the nation.

* * *

Within hours, Soundwave picked up all of the signals from the newsstations around the nation reporting on the Autobot's attempt at blackmailing the Decepticons disguised as the Decepticons blackmailing another human. Arizona local news was at the Navajo Council but they all were locked in their building, not talking to the press.

"I feel we should celebrate." Megatron said, raising his hand. "For once, the title of Decepticon has fallen down upon those who gave us the name to begin with." He crushed his hand into a fist and roared. The drones around the bridge of the ship roared with him.

* * *

In a separate room, Soundwave and Kirsten exchanged a private moment, Soundwave couldn't be happier with the way Kirsten had fallen into her rank and Kirsten couldn't have been more relieved that she hadn't actually chosen the 'wrong side'...but just a different side... than what the humans had originally thought.

Soundwave cupped her cheek and pushed her against the wall of the gateway room, their office. Kirsten moaned into his audio receptor as he lifted her butt effortlessly and her legs wrapped around his slim waist. Her wings scratched against the hard wall and she clawed at his mask, begging for him to remove the slick surface that hid his face. He obliged happily as there was nothing more satisfying to him than seeing her powerless against him with his own working eye.

His sharp hands pinned her wrists against the wall and he held her up with his long leg between her legs.

From on the bridge, Megatron received a signal from Autobot base. Megatron smirked and told his workers to open the transmission.

"Megatron!" It was Optimus Prime on screen. "What have you done?!"

Megatron smiled at the screen and only nodded, "Well, well, Optimus Prime. I'm sorry, you'll have to talk to my ambassador."

"Quit with the peaceful act!" Optimus said back, enraged, "I know exactly what you are up to. I will not allow another human to become one of your army."

_Meanwhile._.

Soundwave had his head buried in Kirsten's neck when the call came through. The screen beeped twice and Soundwave peeked out from under Kirsten's chin to see who the hell it was.

Megatron. Who, unfortunately, always came first. Soundwave reached to the keyboard and opened the transmission with Megatron peering directly into their intimate moment. Luckily for them both, their armor was still attached. Soundwave stepped back, lowering Kirsten to the ground and they both looked at the screen.

"Kirsten, meet me in the bridge, now, it is of utmost importance." Megatron said and then closed the transmission, not mentioning a single word of their interrupted privacy.

Knocking her head against Soundwave's chest, she cursed and began to walk out of the room. Soundwave grabbed ahold of her arm before she got too far away and pulled her back against his chest.

"I have to go!" she said.

Soundwave's arousal was hard to suppress, but he tried as much as he could, as he couldn't let his master wait.

_back on the bridge..._

Optimus Prime looked slowly around the room while Megatron stared back in silence.

"Megatron you..."

Megatron interrupted Optimus' words with a simple hand gesture which introduced Kirsten, who's click clacking footsteps could be heard approaching from behind him.

"Kirsten, have you met Optimus Prime?" Megatron glanced at her, looking stern and serious but with a hint of playfulness in his eyes. "Talk to him." he commanded and stepped behind her.

Kirsten looked wide-eyed at the screen where Optimus's face was. He was a handsome bot with smooth features and kind eyes. But what had happened earlier had changed everything she may have thought about him.

"Optimus Prime? What can I do for you?" Kirsten started, not exactly knowing what was going on, but was willing to ad-lib what she could.

"Megatron! You have put all of us in jeopardy with your careless action!" Optimus said with passion towards Megatron, not Kirsten, "How can you do such sparkless acts against your own kind."

Kirsten turned to Megatron behind her who only looked at her and nodded her way. When Kirsten figured out that he wasn't going to say anything, and let her do the job, she gulped and turned back to face Optimus Prime.

"Optimus Prime, you were the first to double cross us." Kirsten said forcefully into the screen.

"I only obliged the humans wishes, whom we protect."

"But you used human-kind to benefit yourself." Kirsten retorted. Megatron smirked behind her.

Optimus sighed and held his voice for a moment before speaking, "It wasn't my idea. It was Agent Fowler's idea. Megatron, you know I wouldn't have it in my spark."

"I know, because you're soft." Kirsten heard Megatron say from behind her.

"So the US government used you, to use President Sully, to use us, to blackmail his cousin, for the purposes of making us look bad, just so that you could interfere?" Kirsten recapped.

"You are not one of them Kirsten! You are a human!"

"I am neither!" Kirsten said angrily back.

"The governments are fighting among themselves about us. Who is for the Autobots? Who is for the Decepticons? Never in my processor had I imagined it going this far with your peaceful and uncharacteristic negotiations. They will start fighting among themselves." He addressed that statement to Megatron, who only frowned back at him. "Kirsten don't let them brainwash you into thinking what they're doing is right!"

Kirsten heard Megatron chuckle. Megatron placed his hands on his hips regally and turned to Kirsten.

"Kirsten...who's idea was it to make peace?" he asked her.

Kirsten knew what he was trying to get at, and with her life in Megatron's hands at the present, she gave him what he wanted to hear. "It was all my idea, Optimus. A human's idea. They have done nothing to me that I haven't agreed to myself. I know that it is concerning to you."

Megatron wouldn't knowingly give her all the credit, but since she was saying it to Optimus, then he figured that he could spare his voice for the moment.

"Drop the charade Optimus! You were used by your own allies, doesn't that make you angry!?" Megatron said, shocking Kirsten when he stepped forward in front of her. "We can build a new army, with all of our resources right here on this planet! Don't you want a bit of that? I will share my technology with you. Don't you want to rule over your own type again?" Megatron said as he turned to Kirsten, indicating that they had intentions of building a new hybrid army.

Optimus sighed and stared into the screen. No matter how inviting the offer seemed, Megatron sharing the technology with the Autobots, he couldn't do it. He couldn't do it and still keep the human's trust. But it wasn't about protecting the humans now. It was about something much worse. Yes, he had been betrayed by Fowler, but letting Megatron control a new army of his own creation wouldn't go without a fight.

"The next time I see you or any Decepticon step foot on the planet, you can bet I'll be there waiting." Optimus said and ended the transmission.

Kirsten didn't feel like she did much as ambassador, but Megatron started to smile wildly beside her.

"Optimus will soon realize that the humans just want to use them for their own advantage, just like we have done. And when the humans realize that it is us who have them under control, we will slowly start building our army and they'll never even see it coming." Megatron's eyes glowed in the dark room, his powerful ambition showing greater than ever before. Kirsten caught Soundwave's form out of the corner of her eye. In reality, it was all Soundwave's plan. He had devised it all, decided to use the humans to his advantage, and the idea snowballed. Neither of them would tell Megatron that though, especially Soundwave, who had developed the idea in his mind a long time ago, about the time they installed the forcefield in Kirsten's arm.

Kirsten felt a warm surge of power overcome her as she gazed at Soundwave. Had she also become power-hungry without knowing it? Perhaps a by-product of being a giant. But, she had been given the opportunity and hadn't prayed lately. She reminded herself to be humble, but it had become harder. But, again, she had been given the opportunity right? And she had taken it. Soundwave lifted his head her way, summoning her to him. She turned without a word away from Megatron and sauntered in his direction with intent so that they could finish what they had started earlier.

* * *

Later that week, Kirsten had convinced Megatron to let her go scope out the mountain where the precious metal was buried in the rock. Megatron reminded her of Optimus' words, that he would find any Decepticon that placed a foot upon the earth next.

"I think I know how to handle it." Kirsten said back to him.

Soundwave wasn't so sure, even though Optimus never endangered a life form until his own life was in danger, he was skeptical that he would still act the same way after their chat. He indicated to her that he would keep a close eye on here down on the ground from the ship come any trouble.

Kirsten was bridged to the mountainous area. She squinted in the desert sun and looked around. She checked her location with a device Soundwave had given her and she started to walk along the perimeter of the first jut of a cliff. Almost as suddenly as she landed, a rugged Jeep with its top off was heading her way from the opposite direction. Kirsten was startled and stood in a defensive stance and the Jeep swerved suddenly to the side and stopped shortly of hitting her.

Kirsten laid her eyes upon a dark-haired, dark-golden skinned modern version of what she envisioned Pocahontas to look like in the driver's seat. Her khaki cut-off shorts were dirty with fresh mud and the white tank top she wore was equally as muddy. As they began a staring contest, Kirsten began lowering her head to talk to her. The girl looked about her age, and she was fit. Her arms were toned and she had long beautifully shaped legs.

"Which one of them are you?" the Indian girl asked from behind the windshield.

Kirsten was on a knee now, trying to look inviting. "Decepticon, Kirsten." she answered. "Who are you?"

"Luci Silverhorse." she responded, but keeping her gaze straight on Kirsten's face. "I don't want any trouble." she said.

"I'm not here to make any." Kirsten said back. "I am in the process of making an agreement with president Sully to mine part of this mountain, and I am just scouting the territory before we start."

"Oh, you're the one who met with the Council a few days ago." Luci said while she hopped over the edge of her Jeep. She had hiking boots on and they were muddy too.

"Why are you so muddy?" Kirsten asked without thinking.

Luci smiled and leaned over the rear of her Jeep. When she popped up again, she had a gun and stuffed it in her back pocket. "I'm mining, myself. For...stuff." To Kirsten, it was obvious that she didn't want to tell her what for.

Kirsten took a liking to her. She looked beautiful yet rugged, charming yet dangerous.

"Just for your information, Sully isn't a good person." Luci said, looking for tracks. "But then again...I guess you may not be either."

"I want to work with people who want to work with me, not against me. And I will work with them." Kirsten said, watching her.

"Want to help me?" Luci asked, taking her gun out of her pocket and aiming it at the ground. She shot. The sand became alive, writhing wildly and exposing a rattlesnake. It fell to the ground dead within seconds. Luci took a knife from her front pocket and cut off the snake's rattle.

"These make good trinkets." she said.

"Is that what you're mining?"

"No, I'm looking for water wells. I'll um...I'll tell you something worthwhile if you want to be my shovel for a bit? Unless you're too busy scouting." she walked away, her dark golden legs pounding away at the dirt beneath her. Kirsten had been on the lookout for other girls to add to the new hybrid army. She wondered if Luci would be a suitable candidate. She thought quickly, she'd have to negotiate this just right...

"Tell me what you know first, and I will see to it that you find water."

"Don't negotiate with Sully, he's an evil guy. You don't look as evil as him to be honest. But... I found just around the edge of the east face of the mountain, a finger about your size. So I buried it, thinking someone else would want it and trade it."

"You found a mechanical finger?" Kirsten asked in surprise. "I wonder whose..."

"Sully doesn't care about the Navajo people. All governments are the same. All the capital goods go to them and the people get left in the dust." Luci went back to her jeep and started the engine, "Follow me!" she yelled. And the Jeep sped off with a trail of dust behind her, Kirsten only had to jog to keep up with the Jeep.

She stopped when they had rounded the first edge of the cliff, Luci got out and put her gun in her pocket again and motioned for Kirsten to follow her.

"So...being a female robot, how is that?" Luci said, wandering into a small crevice in a tiny cave on the ground.

"It's fun." Kirsten said back to her, not wanting to let on that she used to be human just yet.

"I've only seen the males on TV." She yelled from inside the cave's crevice and she lugged something big and heavy looking out. Kirsten reached for it, and picked it up easily.

Yep, it was a finger alright, it looked similar to hers, joints and everything. Perhaps it was a drone's.

"I'm going to call some back up, don't leave." Kirsten said to Luci, and she nodded.

"Soundwave, can you see this?" Kirsten asked, tapping into her communication device. Laserbeak made herself known and flew down over the ledge to Kirsten. She did a loop around before landing on another lower ledge.

"Anything interesting?" Kirsten asked.

Luci watched as the giant leaned over and put the finger back down on the ground, and waited.

Luci tugged at the turquoise necklace she had around her neck while they waited.

A green light shone from not far away and a red and white bot stepped through. Knock Out was on the scene and he walked over to examine the item. Luci flinched at his sudden appearance and stumbled backwards. Her eyes went wide looking him over.

It had been a while since Kirsten and Knock Out had spoken. It had been tense between them since he had been rejected by her and he was hard to get over it. He picked up the finger and ran a device over it. He looked perplexed at the results and shook his head.

"It says it's Starscream's." Knock Out said perplexed. "He disappeared a long time ago, never came back." Knock Out set the finger back down.

"Who's this?" Knock Out asked suddenly, unhappy to find another human lurking around him.

"I found it." Luci said back to Knock Out.

"Knock Out this is Luci, she led me here."

"Well hope she's not as stubborn as you were when I first tried to talk to you, because I would like to know where exactly this was found, here?"

"Yes, right here where we stand." Luci stood up from her bent legs.

"I'm going to do a scan of the land here, it is odd to find just one finger and we'll get to the bottom of this."

Kirsten left Knock Out to find out about the finger while she went searching for a well, even though she didn't know how. Assuming that a well would be where something grew would be a good sign, there was nothing growing in the area, not even a dead tumbleweed. She leaned over and put her audio receptor to the ground to see if she could actually hear anything. She tapped the ground a few times and moved to another location and tapped the ground and continued around the mountain. Might as well keep her word to Luci, she hadn't had any idea of what she was scouting for, and this may have led to something bigger than what was previously intended with her visit.

_Later_...

The hot desert sun slowly made its way to the west and began to lower. Knock Out had walked the cliff face edge to edge but had picked up nothing except for a mass back where Luci had found the finger. He couldn't shake the feeling that she kept watching him. He'd had enough of human females, they had just caused him trouble so far. Wishing he could just blast her away, she had indeed led them to something valuble, which he didn't deny. He calmed his nerves and turned to face her.

"Stop following me." He said.

"But I'm curious, and I'm making sure you don't hurt the sacred mountain."

"Look, if I hurt it, it's a rock. Right?" Knock Out said, flinging his arms about. "Why is it sacred?" Knock Out asked, trying to turn the situation into something informative. He suddenly felt like Soundwave.

"My people have always visited this rock to add riches to their lives."

"No one is here now, it seems that the riches have run out." Knock Out scoffed at her.

"No one is here because they are scared of the snakes that guard it. I want to find water and remove the threat of the snakes so that people will come back, and learn the power of their compassion again, for the land..." Luci lowered her head.

Knock Out tapped on the rock mockingly, "Hey rock, give me some riches would ya?" He scoffed in laughter at her but then a piece of the rocks surface broke off, revealing a metallic ore underneath it. Knock Out looked at it closer, it seemed to move underneath his gaze.

"Oh...shit." he whispered.

_Around the corner_..

The mountain seemed to groan, and Kirsten turned her head towards the rocky pertrusion. 'What the...' Kirsten frowned at the sound. She stood up from her place on the ground and watched a small section of rock fall the the ground, revealing the same metallic ore that Knock Out had seen. This must be the ore they will be mining...Kirsten thought, and glad that she knew that it was actually there.

_Back around the corner..._

"Are you still watching me! You're like a little bug!" Knock Out said perturbed at Luci for watching just over his shoulder as he scanned the mass below the land.

"But I like watching you." Luci said, "The land is a sacred place and you work with it so methodically."

If it hadn't been for Kirsten's presence on the ship and his fondness of her over time, he would have already shot the girl into oblivion, but patience had taught him wiser. Kirsten didn't talk to him willingly at first though, Luci didn't seem to think twice, but nothing she said was pointless, it wasn't words. They were thoughtful, relevant sentences And questions. Knock Out shook his head again, he WAS becoming like Soundwave!

"It's because I'm a doctor, I'm good with my hands." Knock Out said snobbishly.

"How good?" Luci said and leaned up against the side of a large boulder.

Knock Out turned swiftly to look at her and she crossed her arms, a playful pursing of her lips indicated to him that she was testing his humor. Knock Out felt a tug of a smile coming out from the opposing side of his mouth but hid it, continuing to scan the land as if not interested at all in her. "REAL good honey." He responded, knowing himself that he couldn't play that game for too long. Especially with her looking the way she did in her muddy clothes. Suddenly he didn't mind her looking over his shoulder.

_Around the corner again..._

Kirsten did it, she found a well, her arm was almost shoulder deep when the spring started flowing to the surface. She risnsed her muddy arm with its clean water and went to Luci's Jeep to find a pipe that she knew that she had seen in the cargo space. When she was done with the pipe, she felt an eerie sensation come over her, maybe because it was getting towards dusk and it was chillier, or this supposedly sacred mountain was indeed some kind of sacred mountain.

She reversed her direction to head back to where she left Knock Out and Luci. 'Oh god.' she thought suddenly. Luci was gorgeous and Knock Out was Knock Out...what had she done! She ran as fast as she could and when she rounded the corner, she witnessed Luci sitting on the large boulder that was beside the cave and Knock Out leaning on it with one arm, another dramatic hand up in the air as he was telling what was apparently a fascinating story.

Kirsten stopped and smirked at the scene. She hadn't seen Knock Out so confidant since before she had told him off. She went to greet them, ready to exchange water stories for finger stories and each of their progress but a swirling green light made her eyes squint into the night. Knock Out jumped to defense and so did Kirsten while Luci pulled her bare legs up by her chest.

There appeared Bulkhead, Bumblebee and Arcee and they left the ground bridge open perhaps for another to soon walk through.

Kirsten joined Knock Out's side with their weapons pulled as they eventually watched Optimus Prime come out of the light, weapons raised.

"If Megatron wants to negotiate, we'll negotiate." He said in a low voice...


	30. Breaking

Chapter 30: Breaking

Knock Out held his hand back, holding Kirsten against the rock and behind him. Luci quickly slid down behind the boulder and hid.

"You're on unfair playing grounds again I see! Not so gallant of you is it?!" Knock Out spat. He aimed his arm weapon up in defense.

"I don't want to speak with you, I want to speak with Megatron. You get him here...now!" Optimus Prime spoke angrily. All of the Autobot's weapons were aimed and charged at the two of them.

Knock Out lowered his head and smirked, "I thought you never put a civilian life in danger. Shoot, and the military won't be on your side anymore if you can't even ensure one little person's life." He glanced down swiftly at the dark human head cowering below him.

"Megatron! NOW!" Optimus Prime ordered and didn't move.

"Laserbeak's here...he knows." Kirsten softly said to Knock Out, who nodded back to her.

"Just don't let your guard down." Knock Out whispered back.

A green light opened and swirled close to them, and just as soon as Optimus Prime glanced the light's way, Laserbeak took off and began shooting at the rest of the Autobots. The attention was now on Laserbeak and through the light came a rush of drone fighters, catching them again, off-guard. Then Soundwave came through, and following him, Megatron.

"Come on! Back up's here, the closer we fight with them the better!" Knock Out rushed forward from the boulder, leaving Kirsten and Luci by the cliff's wall. Kirsten looked down at Luci before darting out towards what had become a battleground.

Shots were fired every way and it was hard to see where they all came from and where they were going. Kirsten found it difficult to dart and fire at the same time but found it easy to manouver from one side of the battlefield to another without being detected. Arcee was seemingly good at it too, perhaps because of the smaller frames of their build.

"Megatron, stop this intrusion, you're act isn't fooling anyone!" Optimus seemed to yell over the battle.

"Who says I'm fooling?" Megatron yelled scathingly back at him, "Fire away, Autobots, and you'll see who might come to our rescue from around the globe! And you can't stop it..." Megatron started laughing at him and continued to fire.

Optimus seemed to take offense to his statement and he yelled to his Autobots, "Autobots! Prepare for manouver B!" and they began to cluster into a group. A green light swirled behind them suddenly and they all ran into it quickly before something flew out of it.

"Bomb!" A drone yelled. The small rectangular container that was left behind began shaking.

The explosion happened in near slow-motion. Kirsten looked to Soundwave, clear in front of her, close to the bomb and began diving backwards as she saw him turn suddenly from it and dive. Kirsten watched the container burst open and she saw a flash of red and a pair of arms grab her and fling her away from the bomb's explosion, shielding her from the blast. The hard claws that dug into her arms were strong and fierce, and the body covering her from the blast was hard and big. The blast shook the ground underneath her and scooted the pair of them back quite a bit, but once the explosion had past, the warmth was still around and she felt heat like she never had before, surprised that she could live through it.

The earth rumbled more and then the dust started to settle. The Decepticons were left in the dust so to speak and then they began to move. Kirsten tried to move her joints but the movement was thwarted by the large Decepticon on top of her who had shielded her from the blast. She figured it was Soundwave, and she was grateful for him. She didn't mind waiting a few more seconds to move, not after just tricking death and destruction. As more dust settled though, she peered through the settling dust and deepening night to find further from her, a silver body standing tall, and a grey and indigo mech standing just in front of him, arms in front of him as shields.

The mech on top of her groaned and she felt the weight of the body rise off from her. Knock Out reached down and helped Kirsten up by the neck plates. She stumbled over on his chest and then looked at Megatron and Soundwave again. 'But wait..' she thought, Soundwave had been right there in front of her.

Soundwave eventually lowered his arms from in front of him and his master. He turned around to assess that Megatron was still functioning at 100% and then turned his attention to the others. He flinched, the others. Kirsten. Where was Kirsten? He scoured the land around himself for her and then found her body not too far away under Knock Out's. He fumed, and his energon froze at the same time. He found her eyes fall upon him as Knock Out helped her up. What had he done.

Kirsten almost gaped with her eyes turning into sorrowful slits and leaned on Knock Out's shoulder. Knock Out could feel the electric tension in the air between them as his eyes fell on Soundwave and then Kirsten and then back again. 'But...Kirsten had been closer than Megatron, and much smaller, why didn't he turn to protect her?' Knock Out pondered and then realized it was probably an honest mistake, but didn't think about it much more.

"I wouldn't think too much about it, Kirsten." Knock Out forced through his vocalizer.

"I-I won't..." Kirsten managed to choke out, "but...Megatron is so much stronger than everyone." she whispered. Kirsten had a small pain in her chest, a pain that she knew was there all along, the pain that Soundwave's life had not been joined, but interrupted by her.

Soundwave had known of his mistake nearly right away. He had forgotten that Kirsten was there, and he had failed to protect her from the blast. Even if he had tried, it would have made a difference, but he hadn't even tried. He had protected Megatron instead, a habit that would be hard to break in battle. It was her gaze that hurt him the most. He actually felt the hurt burning through his body, his chest ached and he could feel his energon veins clenching in his throat. He had managed to disappoint her and ignore her at a moment when it had mattered the most.

* * *

Back on the Nemesis, Megatron finished addressing his troops and briefing Soundwave and Breakdown on the current status of his plan.

"I find it hard to believe that Starscream would have perished on his own, which gives me a reason to think that this location or the Autobots had something to do with Starscream's death. Knock Out, did you bring back the appendage?"

"Yes my liege, and tests will commence as soon as we're done." Knock Out bowed to his master.

"Good, everyone dismissed until further notice." Megatron said and the crew including the drones scattered.

Soundwave was quick to find Kirsten after the briefing, he needed to. He found her standing in the back of the bridge room, arms folded across her chest, staring at nothing in particular. He began to head her way, a little faster than normal. Her optics raised and fell upon him as he walked to her, but the hurt was still there, he cringed inside. When he stopped in front of her, she lowered her optics again, towards the ground. She had been scared, though she had been trained, but not that well, not for that kind of combat. Soundwave gingerly touched her arm, fearing if he moved anymore that she would shatter into tiny pieces with how fragile she seemed to look.

Kirsten replayed the scene in her mind, she couldn't help but do so. How Soundwave had chosen his master over her, how they both knew that he was closer to her, and how he had failed as a companion to offer that protection.

"Am I-...selfish..?" Kirsten whispered into his chest. Soundwave tightened the slight grip he had on her arm.

Soundwave's visor lit up with numbers and angles, simulating that he had made a mistake, she was closer to him than Megatron. But it still didn't explain the fact that he had opted to shield Megatron from the explosion rather than her.

"I'll-...always be second. Won't I." Kirsten said in soft and hesitant words, the hurt returning to her face as she peered at her reflection in his visor. From a distance, they could both hear the sound of a commotion at one of the computers, and Megatron's large footsteps.

"Soundwave! Encrypted message incoming!" Megatron's rough voice yelled.

Soundwave's head turned to the direction of the voice and then glanced back again at Kirsten. He needed to attend to Megatron, but again, he would leave Kirsten feeling like this, he felt torn. Torn between two needs and two persons that he would be fated to choose between forever. He felt Kirsten back up a step and take her arm away from his grasp. He held tighter onto it and jerked her forward.

"Tend to your master Soundwave, I need a break to think..." Kirsten said and ripped her arm from his grip and turned quickly from him to hide the growing pain on her face. Soundwave took a step after her, but heard Megatron's voice call for him again. He vented and clenched his fists tightly. As long as he worked for Megatron, yes, she would come second. He didn't need to tell her that, she had already figured it out. But why couldn't he look past the fact that it pained him to see her feel like that. She was his companion, his mate, they had chosen to fulfill each other's needs physically and mentally. But his mistake could have just cost him all of that. He walked back to the computer where Megatron worked and thought about her free spirit. He could lose her if he made a big enough misstep, and all he could hope for right now was that this mistake wasn't **that** one.

* * *

Kirsten stepped lightly down the corridor, she just needed to walk for a little bit and cool off. She knew when she got into this situation that it wasn't going to be easy. She knew that Megatron always came first. She hadn't counted on the fact that his life also came first and Soundwave would be quicker to protect him above her, and that's what really made her feel inadequate. She didn't belong here, she had tried, but it still nagged at her, that she didn't fit that piece of the puzzle perfectly. Emotions overran her processor, her legs felt shaky and she felt like she couldn't walk another step. If she didn't have Soundwave, she had no one.

Covering her face, her shoulder clunked against the wall and she slid slowly to her knees, unable to think straight. Where was her life headed? Why was she here? Why couldn't she just be happy with being second? It was her life that was on the line, and he had failed to cherish it as she had been led to believe. She trembled when she felt a hand on her back and then another lifting her up by her arm.

"Come on, don't do that here, you'll make a fool of yourself." She heard Knock Out's voice say close to her. She hated the way he worded his sentences sometimes, just like the asshole he was. But then...he had shielded her from the blast...being the asshole that he was.

"Knock Out..." she said, trying to push him away, "you certainly know how to make a girl feel worse."

He laughed softly and propped her up over his shoulders and wrapped a gentle arm around her waist. "You've got some scratches that could be buffed out." He began walking towards his operation room, the weight of her body against him making him feel slightly for her, "Come on."

In his room, Kirsten lay on the tilted table while Knock Out unbent and buffed some of her leg armor that Knock Out had damaged by shielding her from the blast. She lay with an arm over her face and optics closed, trying to relax and trying not to think about her fate.

"So, you talked with Soundwave I take it." Knock Out tried to make conversation.

"Not really..." Kirsten responded shortly. "..probably how it will always be..."

Knock Out tried to think about things that wouldn't piss her off, not now at least. Another trait that the human females and Cybertronian femmes shared, sensitive emotions and the ability to shift moods in an instant.

"How...what will always be?" Knock Out pryed.

"I'll never mean enough to him to come first. But...I should have known that all along." Kirsten rolled her head to the side, "I should have known that I will always be second, but..." she hesitated while her bottom lip trembled, "I never felt the effects of it until tonight."

Knock Out looked at her face under her arm, all he could see were her lips, and they looked full with pain. He took his manual buffer and began rubbing it across her leg plates, "Kind of feels shitty to not be good enough, doesn't it." he said, kind of consciously and unconsciously. "To come in second place...to know, someone else is regarded higher than you, especially by one you care about." his words felt heavy and gruff. Kirsten peeked out from under her arm and opened her eyes to look at Knock Out's face. His expression wasn't objective, it was full of meaning, and he almost looked angry. He must have felt the same way when she had told him that Soundwave had her spark and not him. Kirsten lowered her arm and placed it on his large shoulder.

"Thank you." she said. "I'm sorry."

Knock Out glanced at her hand resting against him and then gazed across the room, unfocused, "For what?" He stopped buffing, wondering what she meant.

"I don't know." she replied back to him, and then felt his eyes on her face, and they caught each other's optics. "You seem to have always been there behind me. And maybe I haven't appreciated it. So, I'm sorry." Her mouth twitched to the side, wanting to express to him her gratitude for protecting her from the explosion, but she couldn't manage a smile, only a twitch.

Knock Out placed a hand on her hand and spoke to her softly. "I know that I am **your** second-place, and you're a smart person. If you ever have an opening for first, let me know."

Kirsten wished she couldn't feel the churning in her abdomen when he said that to her. She wished that he didn't make it so easy for her to fall for him. He had made as many attempts as Soundwave to see to it that she was protected and well. He also had made many attempts to woo her in the past but she couldn't see past his cocky exterior. And now, she was vulnerable. Her relationship with Soundwave was teetering and her emotions were in a chaotic tornado.

"You make it seem easy when you're not such an ass." she said without thinking.

Knock Out's mouth curled into a side smile and continued his buffing on her leg...

TBC!


	31. In the Heart of Stone

**OMG SORRY for uploading the chapter then removing it right away, I wasn't happy with it! So this is the re-post, the re-edited version, so if you've got two chapter 31's I am SOO sorry:P **

**Apologies for the long update! Yes! I love drama! Also, another appearance of Luci. Why another OC you ask? Because transformers doesn't give enough female roles!:P Ever imagine it being the same with guys and MLP:FIM? Well, I do. **

**Yes, last chapter Soundwave screwed himself, what will he do about it? What will others do about it? What will Megatron do about it!? Please enjoy, I have plans, yes I do! Love all yo' faces! *XOXOXO* -K**

**OK get serious...**

Chapter 31: In the Heart of Stone

Knock Out needed to take another trip to the mountainous desert where they had gathered Starscream's appendage and metal samples. So far, Knock Out's discovery about the content was promising. The metal ore that resided in the rock was definitely usable, but just a few more tests and he could be positive. The metal in Starscream's arm had taken on it's own critical data to Knock Out, and he needed to deem the substance safe. As he was briefing Megatron before he left, Kirsten waited beside him, ready to go with him for any human interactions.

"So what you're telling me is that in a short amount of time, we will be able to re-build our numbers, successfully?" Megatron said with a grin.

"Only if I can find a way to make it safe. The information on the part of Starscream that we recovered makes me believe that it will need to be refined enough to make the metal alloy safe to use for constructing and upgrading. But I need to get a big enough sample to test my theory on." Knock Out replied to his master.

"Very well...you know what to do when you find something, report. And Kirsten, stay close behind him for unexpected activity. Since Soundwave is staying up here, and if trouble arises, he will be able to open a groundbridge faster than you could report it." Megatron glanced Soundwave's way, who was not taking any interest in the conversation.

"And of course, the second part of the mission." Megatron said, "We won't hold back this time...Soundwave has tweaked the coordinate beacons of the ship to be more precise than ever. Brace yourselves if that time comes that we need to use the laser on unexpecting Autobots."

The green light appeared and they both stepped through.

Upon being back on Earth, there was a chance that the Autobots would attack them again, but the Nemesis had repositioned itself close to above where Knock Out and Kirsten were so that they could start enacting their plan to get rid of them. They had cloaked their ship and positioned a beacon that would look like the Nemesis far away on the other side of the world if the Autobots were to look.

"Okay...I'll need a small amount of help getting this." Knock Out said to Kirsten. "I need you to hold this and when I say go, I want you to pull it taut, I'll be holding the other end." Knock Out threw her the end of what looked like a rope, but laced with all kinds of glowing crystals. The desert sun was hot and dry, and it was windy. Kirsten felt some sand entering her joints and tried to ignore the annoying sound that it made when she'd move her arms.

"Okay ready?" Knock Out yelled at her from about 20 yards away. Kirsten nodded. "Go!" She pulled the rope taut and she saw a small explosion from Knock Out's end of the cord that seemed to follow the rope towards her. She became unnerved but held still, as Knock Out looked unimpressed with the explosions. Suddenly the rope became heavier and she could barely hold it up, but she could barely see what was going on too at the end of the last small explosion that was closest to her. She shielded her eyes and when the sounds died down, she blinked them open a few times.

The rock and metal that had been ejected from the cliff wall had somehow magnetically attached itself to the rope and it seemed to all glow together.

"Good work, now..." Knock Out leaned in and started on his experiments on the substance, "..to find a way to modify this so that it won't kill us like poor Starscream..." he grinned slightly. Kirsten smirked back and put her hands on her hips, waiting.

In the dry heat, Kirsten could almost feel herself sweating, but it was only a memory of sweating. When she checked her body, there was no moisture dewing up on her metal skin. They had been there at least an hour already, nothing had happened. Kirsten looked back at the cliff face, remembering the last time that they were here, the time that Soundwave had chosen her fate. She wondered what had happened to the small human, Luci, who had hid behind the large boulder.

Kirsten suddenly giggled to herself, thinking about them as small humans rather than fellow humans. Soon, they would be fellow hybrids, and Megatron would allow her to rank over them. The thought pleased her, she felt more like a Decepticon every day, and comfortable with it.

Her audio processors pick up a vehicle in the distance though, she turned, wondering what, and who it was.

"That's it, I've got the solution." Knock Out said from the large metal conglomerate in front of him.

"There's someone coming. I'd hide that information if I were you..." Kirsten said to him, not recognizing the vehicle as Luci's, the only vehicle she had seen around this part.

"Psh, what can those stupid little humans do to us." Knock Out said smugly beside her. It was true, what could they do?

"Sabotage? Autobots? I don't know, but we shouldn't trust anyone." Kirsten said angrily.

Knock Out looked her up and down and smiled flirtatiously, "You become more of a Decepticon everyday, don't you." He chuckled and looked at the vehicle. "I find it irresistible."

The both of them stood large when the vehicle stopped in front of them. Two men got out, both were dressed in a green uniform, they looked like park rangers, but something in Kirsten's gut said otherwise.

"Just checking on what you big folk have going on here." One of them said.

"And what's it to you!?" Knock Out boomed back at him.

Kirsten placed a calm hand on his arm, "Private business." she said over him.

"Nothing's private when you're on sacred land." the other one said.

"Maybe all the more reason for it to remain private." Knock Out spat.

Something white caught Kirsten's eye off in the distance, making a huge trail of dust behind it. She zoomed in on the object, hoping that it was who she thought it was. A large black ponytail waved in the vehicle's wind. It was Luci, and she was trying to say something, she moved her hand choppily and sliced it across her throat while she shook her head from side to side.

Kirsten knew enough of what that meant to distract the two men from taking an interest as to what was approaching from behind them. She didn't know why, but she knew she could trust her.

"What station do you work under?" Kirsten inquired. But they heard the Jeep approaching and turned toward it.

"Damn that woman!" The first one said and pulled out a gun.

"Nuh uh!" Kirsten said and she reached down and grabbed the man with the gun, Knock Out following suit.

"Gentlemen, you are outnumbered." Knock Out said to the one that he picked up. Their hands were trapped and legs useless without a ground underneath them. Luci stopped short of Kirsten's feet and hopped out, stomping hard on the very Earth she considered sacred.

"YOU! Are... much better at stopping two men that I would have been..." Luci said to Kirsten, apparently ready to bring a fight, but not needing to do so.

"It's good to see that you're okay, Luci, after our last encounter." Kirsten said, kneeling. Luci nodded at Kirsten, and then at Knock Out. Knock Out grinned and raised his brow plates at her.

"I saw them heading out here and I knew they were up to no good." Luci said.

"How do you know?" Kirsten asked.

"I've seen them before, I've seen them do...unmentionable things. I've hid behind cactus and rock to avoid them catching me. This place isn't sacred anymore, it's a tomb of filth and political lies!" Luci sniffled as if she were going to cry, but she seemed to hold it in very well.

Kirsten looked at the man in her hand, he was gritting his teeth, and noticeably shaking. She didn't know what to do with them, she didn't want to kill them, but she didn't want them to go free either. Knock Out looked at her, "What now, ambassador?" Knock Out said in a semi-back-to-normal- Knock Out tone.

"Well, let's take them back to where they came from." Kirsten said and smirked.

"Sully." Luci said.

"You work for the President of your nation?" Kirsten questioned. "The very one who tried to blackmail us?" Kirsten raised her own brow plates at the two men.

Suddenly to the side, a green swirling light appeared and two Autobots stepped out. Bumblebee and Smokescreen.

"Drop them!" Smokescreen shouted, pointing a laser at Kirsten. Bumblebee aimed his laser at Smokescreen and one in the other hand at Luci.

"What!?" Luci stumbled backward.

"Don't move!" Knock Out yelled at her, and she obliged. Knock Out glanced at Kirsten, who glanced back, meeting his eyes briefly before what they had hoped would happen, happened. Two very strong lights came swiftly from the air, right down onto Smokescreen and Bumblebee, trapping them in the laser beam's melting power and then sending their bodies into the air, in small pieces. Knock Out and Kirsten turned away from the explosion of light, losing their grip on the men, who unfortunately got Cybertronian shrapnel damage as they both fell to the ground.

It happened so quickly, Kirsten didn't remember it happening until she got to her feet after her audio processors came to. She glanced at Knock Out, still facing the opposite way, cupping a small area of ground. The ground bridge opened as planned, and she tapped his shoulder to come on.

Luci, looked up from Knock Out's cupped arms as he looked down on her dark head. She felt her body, to make sure it was in one piece.

"Come on," Kirsten said to Knock Out as he got slowly to his feet, "Two down..."

"Wait!" Luci shouted after them. Knock Out looked down first, Kirsten following. "Am I not in danger?" She said, panicked. "Can...Could I come with you?" she wasn't looking at Kirsten this time, she was looking at Knock Out. Knock Out looked like he was startled for a moment, then he looked at Kirsten. Kirsten looked into his eyes, and then she peered down at Luci, and back to Knock Out. Kirsten's mouth curled up at the side and she winked at Knock Out where Luci couldn't see, nudging him slightly on the shoulder with hers.

"Of course she can't!" Knock Out said, vieing for excuses. "Well..."

"Let's run it by Megatron." Kirsten said and then she leaned down and swiftly whispered a number into Luci's ear. "You make sure and call that if anyone gives you trouble, okay..."

They had to quickly make it into the swirling light before it disappeared.

* * *

"Stop looking at me like that." Knock Out said.

Kirsten tightened her lips in a cute smirk, "Come ooon..." she prodded, "Just think about it."

Knock Out crossed his arms and lifted his head proudly, "What makes you think I'd have any interest in her?" Knock Out looked Kirsten bottom to top again and sent her a sultry grin, "Especially when I can potentially have you." He said it low and secret, it made Kirsten blush but she turned her head from him.

Megatron was busy addressing Soundwave and Breakdown after Knock Out and Kirsten returned. Soundwave had stopped listening to Megatron altogether, boasting about his accomplishments over the Autobots and the humans. The only thing he was interested in was the audio of the conversation coming from Knock Out. He was confused, he was furious, and he was lonely. A bitter feeling had overcome his processor the moment after Kirsten had returned with Knock Out. And it hurt. It ached like nothing he had ever felt before, and it made him afraid. Soundwave shook off the feeling and nodded to Megatron, not letting him get wise to Soundwave's defiance.

"With your permission to be dismissed, my Lord, I would like to log my samples and solutions for our next step." Knock Out interrupted quickly, so that he could go work. Megatron nodded and looked to Kirsten, motioning for her to come along. "I'll need your help with this next part." They left the room together.

Soundwave couldn't help but notice Kirsten's and Knock Out's companionship growing ever along. He was angry at himself, and he couldn't think straight. He cursed several times in his head and under his mask, the thought ate at him so much. She had wanted a break to think, maybe it was time to stop thinking and start acting. He was slow in his work, slow in his thoughts, and slow in his success. But most of all, he didn't want to hurt like this anymore. And secondly, he didn't want Knock Out to ever feel confident in his smug demeanor ever again.

"Soundwave!" Soundwave heard Megatron yell from beside him. "Are you competent!?" He growled at him.

Soundwave nodded a slow, forced nod, and began the task on analyzing through his wireless connections and eventually showing Megatron what was to become the next step in their battle, taking care of the other Autobots.

"Soundwave, since you seem to be distracted.." Megatron said coarsely, "Take a walk. Check on the laser's energy level and make sure that the drones are doing a complete recharge." Megatron stared at Soundwave's blank face, frowning, knowing something was wrong. "Report back to me after you do, and then we will discuss further implementations of our coming plans."

Soundwave stood still for a moment after his master had released him. How transparent had he become? He found his processor wandering to before he had met the small human. How strong and full of willpower he was. How focused and how manipulative he had Megatron before him. He had changed, and not for the better. He had previously thought that she would ease his distractions, but it seemed just the opposite now. He stepped lightly towards the ship's laser modulators, but before he did that, he decided to take a detour.

He began scratching the walls upon his arrival to his first destination, Knock Out's operating room. His shoulders were tense, his face was tight, this couldn't continue. Whatever she'd done to him and his spark, had to stop.

In the operating room, Knock Out was taking an energon sample from Kirsten's arm. He looked at her gingerly and then welded the cut vein up quickly. Soundwave's loud footstep made both Kirsten's and Knock Out's head snap up abruptly. Soundwave couldn't take it anymore, he had to get her out of his life. He stomped forward swiftly and pinned Kirsten to the operating table that she was still on.

"Soundwave! That-" Knock Out started toward him but Soundwave violently tugged his large shoulder and threw him to the ground. How dare he try to come to her rescue again when it was him who should have always. He was tired of seeing her happier with Knock Out than she was with himself!

"Sound-" Kirsten stuttered in panic but her voice hitched when she felt him drag his sharp fingers over her chest plate where he had carved his symbol before, leaning in menacingly, fighting off the urge to retract his fingers and change his mind. He resisted looking at Kirsten's face which was struck with terror and distress. The shrill scraping of his fingers eased and lifted from Kirsten's chest, leaving it barren of paint and any kind of markings after he was done. He unpinned her and backed up, solemnly.

Kirsten glanced down at her scratched paint, his marking was gone, and with it, her spark. Her hands started to tremble with her understanding of the meaning of his actions. She raised her eyes to peer into his visor. When she did, her chest hurt worse than she imagined it ever hurting, as if something inside her had been hollowed.

Soundwave straightened his metal spine and grew a foot, not wanting anything to ever come between him and his success ever again, and that's why he had to turn away from her.

When Starscream's digit caught his eye, he reached for it.

"Don't you touch that, Soundwave!" Knock Out shouted to him.

Soundwave threw the appendage at Knock Out, who was still on the floor, bewildered by the scene in front of him.

"Soundwave!" Knock Out finally commanded, "What the HELL is wrong with you!" he got to his feet and charged Soundwave with Starscream's arm in hand. Soundwave was having none of it and caught the doctor by his flailing arms. With his mighty strength Soundwave threw him to the ground again before he could think twice about his actions. He was a gladiator, like Megatron. And he needed no one. He shouldn't have anyone. He charged and aimed his tentacle cannons at Knock Out and one at Kirsten, reluctantly.

"S-Soundwave?" Kirsten asked helplessly, timidly, and scared to death.

Soundwave did consider that he went too far this time, but he couldn't take it back now. He felt all mixed up. He wondered what happened to the impeccable control of his emotions, and suddenly, he regretted even coming into the operating room. He shook his head, his processor controlling his actions, and he couldn't help it. He loved her, and that's why he couldn't be near her anymore. He turned his head slowly toward Kirsten, looking at her behind his dark mask, and he gave her a slow, official-looking nod, something casual, something not intimate. She didn't deserve him.

Soundwave retracted his tentacles swiftly and left just as abrupt as he had come, leaving Knock Out and Kirsten to regain their senses on the events.

"Kirsten...are.." Knock Out got up again and went to her side, but stopped suddenly when he found her whimpering into her arms.

"Just go away." she whispered to him, muffled sounds escaping from her self-imprisonment.

Knock Out reached out a hand but held it above her, not touching, while she cried as a human would but with no gratification of tears streaming down her cheeks.

Knock Out became angry for her. She should have been angry at Soundwave because she had done nothing wrong, but instead, she was hurt. Knock Out was furious at Soundwave too, and it was personal. Not only had he disturbed Starscream's arm, but he had threatened him in his own territory, which won't be tolerated. Tensions had always been taut between them, but this just solidified it.

Knock Out swung around when he noticed Kirsten heading into the hallway.

"Where are you going!?" Knock Out said at her, "Don't you want me to fix your paint?"

Kirsten didn't respond and kept walking, too distraught to say anything back to him. She needed to cool down if she was to stay here on the ship without Soundwave's assistance, or support. She felt like her world had been taken away from her again, and they had both happened because of him.

Knock Out's gut was demanding an apology from Soundwave, so he headed to the bridge to do just that, and perhaps give him a piece of his mind. From this moment on, it was personal.

When Soundwave had returned to the bridge, he felt lighter, and a little more focused now that he didn't have a femme to worry about. He didn't need to. He got straight to work on the meticulous new plan to sabotage the remaining Autobots and with good luck, take them prisoner, or kill them too. The Earth would be theirs, and Soundwave would be second highest among the new planet, especially with access to a human on their ship...wait. Soundwave shook and cleared his mind. He wouldn't do it with Kirsten, no, he had seen to it that those feelings were terminated. It was then that he found a presence behind him, so he turned around to see the red and white doctor immediately throw a punch into his face.

Soundwave stumbled but didn't fall, but he had been caught off-guard, and he was taken aback.

"How dare you!" Knock Out yelled into his face, craning his neck upward to speak to the larger mech, "You're a fucking jerk!"

Soundwave stood in silence over him, trying to keep his composure in front of the other drones and crew.

"Fuck you!" Knock Out yelled at him, "Your lonely ass can hang out up here but if you step foot inside my office again, you're dead!" Knock Out roughly pushed Soundwave's bladed arm with his own, antagonizing him into starting something physical. Soundwave only stood there with his silent and blank stare down at Knock Out.

"Come on you coward!" Knock Out was legitimately angry and he let Soundwave know, "Nothing?" He faked a laugh, "You're too predictable..." Knock Out stared back at him as long as Soundwave said nothing, but in a final moment of courageousness, or stupor, Knock Out went in for the kill. He smirked at Soundwave, "Your mute ass couldn't handle her could it?"

Soundwave wished it didn't bother him, but it did, and that's the moment Knock Out felt his body suddenly against the other side of the bridge with a strong impact, crashing down onto the hard floor with a loud clang, pieces of bolts and rivets from the wall tumbling on top of him. Soundwave's tentacle clasped onto Knock Out's head almost immediately afterward and began lifting him from the ground. In a controlled and calm manner, Soundwave walked closer to him, looking dangerous and ferocious.

"Mmhph, jerk.." Knock Out spat when Soundwave was just inches from his face and then raised his feet, kicking Soundwave hard in the abdomen. Soundwave stumbled from the impact and the two mechs ended up on the hard surface of the bridge's floor, scrambling to get up first. When they did, they contested their superiority with a quick draw of their cannons and faced off aiming at each other. They had started to draw an audience from the drones sitting on the bridge and luckily, Megatron wasn't around to see any of it. Knock Out's eyes dimmed at Soundwave, but he surrendered first, disarming his cannon and sheathing it back into his arm.

Soundwave still stood his ground, watching Knock Out's every move from sheathing his weapon, to brushing himself off from the physical fight.

Knock Out had only wanted to threaten Soundwave, he knew that he was more powerful than he was and if things got too rough, he might end up damaged. But he was still angry at him for intruding so rudely into his operating room and taking his tantrum out on Starscream's piece, and Kirsten, which may have ignited the initial spark of his public confrontation.

Soundwave slowly sheathed his tentacles, his gaze not faltering from Knock Out's own smug glare. He had hoped that Knock Out would surrender first so that their conflict didn't escalate any further than it had to. His willpower to win any duel was a stubborn power, and if Knock Out hadn't have ended it first, there would be some damage to pay. Besides, someone had to be there for Kirsten if he wasn't going to be. Soundwave turned and walked back to his computer station and began working on his task, crouching more inside of his shoulders as a barrier than he normally did.

Knock Out rubbed his side where he had impacted the wall of the ship and dropped his head, shaking it. What had happened on their ship? He wondered when did all of this tension start affecting him. He stomped back town the corridor to his quarters to cool off, thinking about the recent past. It had all really started when, when he started to care about Kirsten. "I should have known better..." he said to himself.

* * *

Kirsten needed to get some work done. Between handling the correspondence jobs with their human allies and dealing with her broken relationship, she knew it wasn't going to be an easy task to keep her mind on track. She felt pulled from so many sides so much that she wished that she'd get pulled too hard and just break apart and let it all go. Hugging herself, she turned a corner into a long hallway and found a large, silver mech walking her way. She didn't want to explain herself to Megatron, so she reversed directions and headed the other way.

"A Decepticon does NOT walk like that." She heard Megatron say from far behind her. She stopped in her tracks, knowing that she should acknowledge him, at the very least. She dropped her arms from around her and sighed, lifting her tucked head up proudly, on the outside at least.

"Sorry, my Lord..." she said softly while she hurt and burned in her chest from the recent break-up.

"You are a Decepticon, you don't apologize for things like that. You FIX it, and move on...ALWAYS be proud." He was coming closer to her, and she suddenly felt his large hand on her back. It shoved her into motion, "Walk with me." He said.

He led her to the deck of the ship, where the sun glimmered off of their smooth metal. It was moist in the air today, still dry at altitude, but they must have been above a forest. Megatron clasped his hands behind his back and looked out over the airy sky.

"Things change. Time changes." His voice seemed to roll out from his chest, "I am not adverse to change."

Kirsten listened patiently, wondering what he would say next.

Megatron turned to look at her, and his body twisted into a powerful statuesque pose, "I was a great and POWERFUL leader on Cybertron." He said while his arm was raised, but it fell slowly. "I know that I can never have that again. With changes though, Earth will become my new Cybertron. I cannot do anything else but be a leader, and that is the way it is." He said to her matter-of-factly.

Kirsten wondered she he wanted with her, telling her these things, almost opening up a different side to her, something philosophical, and passionate.

"Will you be willing to see your Earth change? If not, you should speak now because I need your cooperation for my plans."

Kirsten shook a little inside but then thought about it. Change...into what?

"If you are meaning that you want to make Earth a new Cybertron, then, I don't see how I could stop you whether I'm reluctant to your idea or not." Kirsten said honestly.

"So, you will aid me in the process of life-shift?" Megatron asked.

Kirsten peered at him with confusion.

"Like you." Megatron added.

Kirsten knew now. To build his army, to claim the Earth as his own. To gather the strongest and most worthy, and make them metal. Kirsten had already been thinking about it, noted a few people in her mind who would make great Decepticons. She finally was one step ahead of Megatron, just like Soundwave. But just under one condition.

"Yes, I will." Kirsten said, "But I want to succeed over all who follow me."

Megatron looked down at her and snarled a vicious grin, "And you will." His smile was proud and determined. "You have been an exemplary learner thus far, you will make a fine example, and leader among them, under me."

As much as Kirsten missed her life on Earth, she figured to make the best of her life on the Nemesis, until they conquered enough of Earth to settle without the Autobots interfering, that she must take control in her own happiness and not rely on others for support, and that meant taking charge for her future, again. This time, the goal was easy to obtain because of her obvious loyalty, and Megatron saw to it that she was rewarded. She now, understood, everything...

"I have a plan to get rid of the remaining Autobots for good, but I will need everyone's cooperation, and now that we have half of the world on our side, it will be an easier task than previously thought. Destrying two of them should not have put a hitch in the plans. You may just have to do some explaining." He chuckled deeply inside his chest, "I want you to keep working with the humans as ambassador, but I am also assigning you the task of recruiter. You see how this all works now. You all belong to me, and if I like what you do, I see to it that you get your fair share of the prize. And the prize is power, control, prestige...among other material things."

Kirsten had already began to shift her mind a long time ago. She liked the power, though it took her a while to admit it to herself. She noticed Megatron lowering his body to her, and he slid a very sharp finger across her chestplate where Soundwave had scratched her paint. He tilted his head and his smile disappeared.

"What a fool." he growled. His touch sent shivers into Kirsten's spine and down her backside. "It shows his weakness. I would venture to say that you have pick of the litter now." Megatron growled in his throat, seeing an opportunity.

Kirsten kept her gaze straight, remembering Megatron's words to always remain proud. "To me, Soundwave was the top of the litter already, how could I downgrade." Kirsten said to him, trying to not let the pain bother her.

Megatron's face glowed and his lips twitched at the side, "There's only one mech that transcends Soundwave..." His face slowly became shadowed by his crouched shoulders, "And I believe you worthy." His voice cut through her emotional shield, and he almost had her. He was so powerful, dangerous, large, he was the ultimate leader.

"I don't." Kirsten said immediately and took a step back, "He may be off my person, but he still resides in my mind." She hesitated a few seconds, "But, he did what was right for the both of us, I guess." Kirsten said, bitterness cutting through at the back of her throat.

"How do you know it was right?" He questioned her. "You don't feel well about it. I can tell." He placed his large hand near her face.

Megatron had advanced to her before, but how she was willing to not fall to the powerful aura that he emitted was beyond her comprehension. It was, and it would always be Soundwave. She took another step back, away from his gaze and touch.

"Ease your processor, Kirsten. With time, you will too change again, or, time will change it for you." Megatron said to her, heightening back to his full posture. "You have become a strong femme."

Kirsten lifted her head proudly to him and said, "I remain hopeful that time will change first."

"You are loyal. A trait that every mech wants in his femme. Something Soundwave should have seen and valued before he cut you loose." Megatron said as he sauntered to the side of her, "For the respect I have for Soundwave, I hope he realizes it before it's too late. You're dismissed."

...to be continued..


	32. Wounds

_I know I know... long update. Sorry :) A shorter chapter here, but trying to transition into the final part of the story. Thanks all my readers who have stuck with me thus far! I apologize for making ya'll wait so long for the update, I just have had no time :[ I have no more excuses... I hope that it does not disappoint!:) Luv yo faces! ~K_

Chapter 32: WOUNDS

Soundwave worked, and as he did, he found his mind on task and ahead of schedule, just like it should be. It had been almost a week since he had his last moment with Kirsten. Knock Out's presence didn't bother him any, but when he would sense Kirsten nearby, the emotions he would experience would confuse him. He didn't know whether he liked what he felt or not. It was something totally new to him, and not knowing how to handle it was part of the problem. So he would just ignore it, and ignore her.

He noticed one day that she finally did get a re-touch on her paint after he had so rudely marred her. He was glad that she had fixed it and moved on. At least he was supposed to be glad, wasn't he? Kirsten had filled a void that had been empty for most of his existence, but the absence of her warmth after having it made him feel uncomfortable in his abdomen, even after accepting the fact that he could no longer make the relationship work.

It was one day on the ship before Megatron's soon-to-be-implemented attack to imprison the remaining Autobots that stirred an uncomfortable air in the Nemesis.

Megatron suddenly called Kirsten on her screen from the gateway room. Kirsten answered in the middle of putting together her project for Canada.

"Kirsten."

"Yes, Lord Megatron!" she answered briskly.

"I need a mining status report from the shores of Costa Rica, that supplies most of our ship operations."

"I-" Kirsten cursed in her mind. Soundwave had done all the reports for her thus far, she had no idea how to put one together. "What... do you need and ..-uh..." Kirsten panicked and began searching the large keyboard for an answer of some sort. "Okay..." she continued.

"What was that?!" Megatron boomed back.

"Yes, Lord Megatron!" Kirsten said appeasingly, and his face disappeared from the screen.

Kirsten grunted. She now had to figure out how to put a report together. Was it the same as when she had to write reports for her student projects? She tried a few different keys, ones that she'd never used before, but nothing gave her the answer that she was looking for. Soundwave's reports were complex and informative, how could she possibly put something like that together as a novice, she wondered. She pushed more keys, seeing if there was any kind of answer to her quandary.

"Damn..." she huffed quietly. Usually when Megatron wanted something, he wanted it immediately. She thought about the next available option. Soundwave. She leaned on the keyboard while she contemplated her decision. Pursing her lips to the side she thought about the pros and the cons of asking for his help. At the worst, he says no, and she has to figure it out, which may take some time. But on the other hand, best possible outcome would be, they would get to interact, he says yes, he apologizes and sweeps her off her feet. She rolled her eyes at herself.

Kirsten shook her head and leaned over the computer's keyboard. She rested her head against the ledge of the workstation and tried hard not to let her emotions take a hold of her. She began humming a small tune to help with her thoughts, not exactly sure if it was a tune she knew or something that she was making up. It comforted her thoughts, which were running rampant with the playback in her mind of the last time she ever talked to Soundwave, when he'd scratched the paint clean off of her, and left the room without a word.

"What happened, Soundwave...?" she asked herself in a small whisper. As if in a blink of an eye, they had something wonderful between them, and then gone. She blinked into the arms covering her head. She wondered if she could have done anything differently. Maybe she had been selfish. She was in a different world now, and that was never going to change. Maybe it was time to accept the fact that her and Soundwave's master was Megatron, and he was number one.

She stood up again and rubbed an arm with the smooth metal of her hand, uncomfortably.

* * *

_Elsewhere..._

Soundwave stood perched at his workstation on the bridge. He was wired into the satellites, tracking. He was tracking the movement of the Autobot beacons he'd managed to tag and they were moving to their mountain. He smirked from behind his visor. What did they think they were going to do? Steal all the rock and metal for themselves after they discovered that the Decepticons were after it? They had no clue what their plans were. He felt a warmth approaching from his left side, so he turned his head. Kirsten stood there, waiting, looking disturbed.

Soundwave almost flinched when he saw that it was her, after both of them had made such obvious detours in the ship to avoid running into each other. Her eyes were downcast, her fingers fumbling nervously in front of her breasts, what an awkward mess she looked. Soundwave couldn't help but stare at the small hybrid in concern, nearly afraid of what she would say to him. With the way he had treated her last, he wouldn't be surprised if anything that came out of her vocalizer was positive, and the surprise hit him like a freight train when she said:

"Soundwave, I need your help..." with a solemn and meek voice.

...

Just a bit of business, Soundwave reminded himself. He walked with her to the gateway room, the room where it had all started. He thought he should have put up a little bit of a fight before agreeing to help her with piecing together a report, but right away he had nodded, as if something inside him knew that he would do anything he could for her. But, it benefited the whole of the Decepticon reason didn't it?

Kirsten watched him work at the station, her eyes wandering around his back, but he was done so quickly that she didn't even have time to even think about trying to talk to him. He turned to her and pointed at the screen. On it was a template of data reports and he showed her where it was to be found, and then he reached forward and pulled something out of the workstation's surface, a small disc. His visor displayed the data that he put on it and then he displayed a map of the ship, showing her where to archive the copy for storage.

Soundwave couldn't help but secretly look at the area where he had once carved his ownership of her spark, and how there was no trace of it left anymore. He was disturbed to still feel the battle brewing inside of his gut, but he knew that he couldn't dedicate 100% of himself to either Kirsten or the Decepticons if they were both in his life, and he wasn't able to tell her why. Every deviation from success, every broken hope from battles fought, and every mistake was there to follow him, always. From the scars on his face to Kirsten, he let his mistakes plague him to teach him future lessons. She would just be another scar, to fall, and then learn from. He held the disc out to her.

Kirsten took the disc from Soundwave's long arm, but he didn't let go when she tugged. She looked into his visor inquisitively and tugged again. Kirsten thought in a panic. There they stood, joined by a small disc and nothing in between, not even words, but the connection that had been made was emotional. It said more than words could have ever said and to feel his power countering hers, made her energon beat fast. But her face quickly turned from inquisitive into an annoyed frown.

In that moment, Soundwave realized that Kirsten wasn't afraid of him, even after all he had done. Suddenly he found himself longing for her to speak to him, even if it was short and meaningless. He wanted just even a small whisper of a sound, he wanted to hear her, but instead, he let go of the disc.

Kirsten flipped it over in her hand and bit her bottom lip with her metal teeth.

"Thanks," she said. Simple. To the point. That was all that was needed. She began to walk out of the room, the room that they had spent so many hours, days, months in together. The room where they first realized their interest in each other. The room she saw Soundwave standing at the door so many times, entering when she least expected him to, and leaving on a whim. And this time, it was her who was walking out on him, but she stopped in the doorway.

Slowly turning her head to him, her gaze was that of forgiveness, "I appreciate it." Kirsten heard herself say, then she continued her stroll out of the room completely.

What kind of magic had she weaved on him...Soundwave thought as he walked back to his other work. How was she able to question the very instincts inside of him and turn them into peaks of obstacles and problems. How did she do it? The smallest, most insignificant words to come out of her mouth made him regret his entire fiasco in Knock Out's room, something he knew she'd never forgive him of, even if he asked. She appreciated him? After all that. 'She still...appreciates me?' He processed. Soundwave didn't know what to make of it. He didn't know what to do. No one else ever thanked him for his work or appreciated his time. His work and time was merely just expected.

Carrying on with his work within the room, a few hours passed before Megatron contacted him regarding the reports. The screen bleeped and Soundwave looked up expectantly and answered.

"Soundwave." Megatron was in front of him. Soundwave acknowledged him with a slight nod of the head.

"Off the shores of this, Central American continent, our operations have been compromised based on the reports coming back. Without detection, I need to know why. Our resources are drawn thin so do what you can to stay stealth as I don't know if I may be able to provide backup. Just get me an image."

Soundwave nodded to his master and turned around to deploy Laserbeak. A ground bridge opened to the Costa Rican country's coordinates and she entered.

Soundwave opened Laserbeak's transmissions on the ship's screen and guided her signal where he needed to see. The energon collecting was under the water, and the banana harvesting season was coming to an end. There were no drones in the fields that she flew over, but then he saw one. It was unresponsive in the midst of banana fields, very likely terminated. He guided her over the waters and scanned the sea for signals. Nothing. Impossible, his reports said that there should be three on duty. He began to think that Megatron had good reason for concern.

His audio sensors picked up a heavy sound from Laserbeak's signal, and her transmission suddenly went dead. Soundwave jumped at the sudden interruption and immediately tried to get her signal back online. When he couldn't make any video connection, he knew something had gone wrong. What Autobots were left? Optimus Prime, Arcee, Bulkhead and Rachet. He recalled seeing a few of his beacons heading to the mountain just earlier, but were they still there, or had they already bridged elsewhere? He assumed the worst and counted on all four of them being in the area at the time when Laserbeak went down, he was undoubtful that a human-made weapon could do that to her. In the midst of trying to calm his processor over Laserbeak's unknown survival, he contacted Megatron to update him on the status of the search.

"What!? Those damn Autobots!" was his reaction in the light of the computer. He sighed and took a moment to think about his reaction. "We need to act now, we know where they are, and we know what to do..." He lifted his optics slowly into the screen, burning into Soundwave's own optics. It was time to take what they wanted, and bring to life a new civilization in their image, and the only ones stopping them were those that didn't understand...the Autobots.

"Soundwave, meet me in the bridge room, alert the rest of my armada." And Megatron's face disappeared.

* * *

On the bridge, many drones stood and Soundwave approached, knowing what was about to happen. Kirsten and Dreadwing stood in the ranks and Megatron was about to lead them towards the soil.

"Terminate if you have to. Leave no Autobot thinking that they have a chance. This is our battle. Take from them what they have taken from us. Soundwave, infiltrate connectivity and stop all communications to outside sources. It will be inevitable that we will soon encounter the human armadas but we will try to delay them. Knock Out, operate the groundbridge. Kirsten, I will need you to be our bait once again. Let's go."

Kirsten had only a brief time to connect the dots as to what she was about to do. Bait again...what did that mean exactly...?

"In you go." Knock Out said from the groundbridge operations, "You will exit the groundbridge in the rotunda of the Costa Rican capitol building, that's inside." The green light swirled in front of her and Dreadwing pushed her from behind as to not let her linger longer than she had to.

"Armed." Megatron said to her with a smirk.

This time, she did not look to Soundwave for comfort before she entered as she had habitually done in the past, but into the dizzying spiral of the brightness ahead of her, giving her only seconds to deduce her plan of action before she was sent swirling into the light. Her vision was so focused on her plans and the direction she was headed that she missed the small nod that Soundwave gave her before she disappeared.

_My signature cliffhanger ;D Next chapter to be quite more eventful hopefully!_


	33. Boiling Point

_Hi! Lots of stuff going on in this chapter! A little bit of mischief, a little bit of drama, a little sad, a little happy, don't focus too much on the heroism. I get bored writing battle scenes so I hope that this is adequate! lol. Unexpected turn of events happen, more betrayals and more double-crosses! I think the reason I had such a hard time continuing writing an update including last chapter, was I couldn't quite think of how to handle the direction of the story with the elements I wanted, in a logical way. So I think I figured it out and I hope it works. Ciao! LUV your reviews! Really! I appreciate each and every one of them:) I am so glad you all still held on as long as I took to update! But hey, that's what summertime is for! Fun, and time;P ~K_

_Boiling point seems like an appropriate title for this chapter, wasn't there an episode called that? It may just be so common that I'm thinking of something but don't really know what. Hah. Please take the time to enjoy the drama at the end of the chapter and imagine some powerful music to go along with it!:)_

**Chapter 33: Boiling Point**

In the Capitol building, the Costa Rican president was walking down the hall towards the rotubda with Agent Fowler.

"This is dangerous, I can't believe I let you talk me into this, Fowler!" Laura said in her Latin accent. "Your country better do its job."

"I assure you we are ready, so is Optimus Prime..."

Suddenly, the groundbridge carrying the hybrid Decepticon opened just seconds after they exchanged their words.

"Don't panic..." Fowler said to Laura as he fled into a doorway to hide himself.

Kirsten stood up tall, the rotunda was high enough to allow her a full stretch inside of the building. The sweet, salty coast air filled her joints and she detected the humidity, but she also detected something else in the humidity, something that didn't make her feel comfortable. It felt like static. Kirsten had to think fast.

"President Chinchilla, I came as soon as I saw my reports, something has happened to our field workers and I came with concern." Kirsten kneeled on a knee as soon as she began talking, acting the innocent, not really knowing what was about to happen afterward. She really knew that the Decepticon army was soon to be on their way. What she was almost certain of, was that they were not going to be on good terms after this confrontation.

"Kirsten," Laura bowed her head at her, "We were just about to contact you, it just happened so suddenly!"

"Was it the Autobots?" Kirsten knew the answer already but when time and distraction was the aim, she couldn't think of anything better to say. "Are your people safe?"

Laura seemed to fumble over her words, something wasn't right. "Well, we know it was the Autobots, the, leader wasn't happy with your operations. We know you're at war with one another, please don't bring us into it."

"We have no intention of doing such a thing." Kirsten said, "We will make sure that this is settled without any problems on your soil."

"I'm afraid that's not an option, we will settle this now." Agent Fowler suddenly appeared from the shadows and he had a large weapon in his hand. "We've got Optimus Prime on the north side of the building, Arcee on the south, and the rest surrounding the building, if you even dare to call for help, we will fire."

Kirsted was waiting for something like this, out of the back of her conscious mind, she assumed there would be a surprise somewhere in the meeting. She held her hands beside her in surrender and tried to make sense of who was working for whom. She laid optics back on Laura, whose eyes were downcast, looking guilty and uncomfortable. She turned to Agent Fowler, whose eyes were on her, whispering into a small communications device on his shoulder.

"I've been nothing but peaceful to everyone I have come into contact with. I don't understand the reason behind your motives." Kirsten said firmly.

"That's exactly the problem!" Agent Fowler suddenly erupted, "We thought that we had our heads on straight, but we let the Autobots lead us into your trap, and now the entire world is bowing to your kind, and human-kind won't stand for it anymore!" Fowler lowered his already darkened eyes, "We want our Earth back..."

"But the Autobots are your allies...they have no means to-" Kirsten was interrupted by a shot that Agent Fowler fired in her direction. Kirsten ducked out of the way and made a break for the large double doors while she had the chance. As the glass doors shattered and the frames fell inward, Kirsten rolled out onto the steps of the entrance. Outside, the static that she had felt in the air became stronger.

When she focused immediately after, she was surprised by the quiet entrance from the Decepticons, and the stand off that was already transpiring. Drones were surrounding the building, armed and ready, Dreadwing's weapons were pointed at Arcee and one at Bulkhead, who both had weapons pointed at Dreadwing and one at Megatron. Megatron had his weapon aimed at Optimus, and the other at the political building, and Optimus had his own aimed at Megatron and the other at Kirsten.

Kirsten looked startlingly around. The air was so quiet besides the hum from approaching helicopters and tanks. Had they just walked into a trap? Kirsten wondered.

"I see you're two short." Megatron smirked at Optimus.

"I see that you came prepared." Optimus said back, but didn't return the smirk, "Stand down, the world's armies are approaching and are ready to fight."

"Let them." Megatron snarled back.

Agent Fowler appeared from the broken doorway of the capitol building, for some reason, he emitted a powerful aura which drew Optimus' and Megatron's attention. Fowler looked darkly into the sky and tapped his shoulder communication again and with slow, deliberate words, said, "Do it."

The electricity in the air ignited and strands of static were overloaded. The Decepticons flinched and held their heads in pain. The Autobots flinched and held their heads as though they were about to explode, just like the Decepticons.

"Fowler..." Optimus said as he dropped to his knees, unable to move, "Something has...gone wrong..." he said, dropping to the Earth as the powerful overload ran through his circuits like all the rest, immobilizing him and the others.

Fowler said nothing, but looked regretful. "I'm sorry, Optimus..." he whispered quietly for no one to hear and then talked into his communication again just as quietly, "Launch missile."

Kirsten's optics widened when she heard him say that, unknown to him that she was close enough still to hear. She felt sluggish, but not completely immobilized. The overloaded power in the air which was traveling fluidly because of the humidity didn't quite seem to affect her the same as it did the others, she was hopeful that it was because of her non-thouroughbred body. She dared not move though, to not attract unwanted attention while she tried to search for any signal of rescue for them all. Fowler had betrayed Optimus Prime it seemed, and she needed to make sure that he knew that.

* * *

_Meanwhile..._

Soundwave had found the highest communications tower and plugged himself in. Accessing all of the information highways, he found what he was looking for. He re-routed himself into the international lines and cables, scrambling their messages. He then tapped into the local audio frequencies just as soon as Fowler had informed his troops to start moving in. The Autobots and the world army? Soundwave thought, it sounded like a double-cross. He kept listening to the frequency as he stole data and erased his trail as he went. Again, he heard Fowler's voice say to 'Ready the missile."

Soundwave smirked, that wasn't going to happen. He tapped into the information data about the missile and found its coordinates. He immediately shut down communications to that location and severed power by overloading their circuits. It seemed that the missile that was destined for their location was thwarted just in time before Soundwave heard Fowler whisper deliberately, "Do it."

An incredible surge of power overcame Soundwave and he fell unconscious briefly and then regained consciousness, but as he was falling to the ground. A small blast had unhinged him from the tower and he was unable to transform and fly or move at all. What was this!? He thought. He hit the ground with an enormous thud and he felt his circuits and wiring being affected by something powerful in the air. It hurt so much, his body became choked with static and he fell victim to the wave of energy pulsing throughout the humid air. He wished he could move and scratch his metal skin, it agitated the very plates of his armor and inside his body. He began to lose consciousness again. He felt like exploding from the inside, and wondered how long it would take for his energon to start boiling with the rising static temperature that his body was taking in. He only wished that his comrades were able to pull out of it, because it looked like his own body wasn't going to be functioning for too much longer, he was too connected to the energy.

His processor wandered while he lay in the grassy field below the tower, the tips of the long tropical grass waving in front of his optics as he stared upward in pain. This surge of electricity would immobilize any large conductor within a ten mile radius, he thought as he measured the levels, but then had to stop in order to save energy. And then he thought about Kirsten. Loyal Kirsten. Strong Kirsten. Her dna was different, maybe she was different. She, had always been different. He regretted. He now knew what had been nagging him nearly the whole time that he knew her. He had someone that cared about him. Not just a teammate, but someone who legitimately cared for his safety for reasons other than battle or the good of the whole. There was no 'whole' with him, it was only him, and he was the only mech that had the luxury of having it. To have thrown it away said more about himself than it did of her. If only he could survive, he promised himself to tell her...to let her know, what he should have said a long time ago. If not... he hadn't missed the conversation between her and Megatron, at least he would he loyal to her if she so chose him for a companion. He grunted, fighting his failing consciousness and wincing from his aching joints and organs.

* * *

_Back at the capitol building..._

"I said launch missle!" Fowler yelled louder into his communications device. "Hello!? Damnit..." Fowler huffed and scurried down the stairs past the immobilized Cybertronians. Soundwave had cut the connection just in time.

Kirsten crawled on her belly towards Optimus Prime. If she could get him to believe her, then they may have a chance. Her body ached as she moved, but she could move at least. A headache started to grow behind her optics.

"Optimus!" she half-yelled, half-whispered, "Please listen to me!" she said, her mouth close to his forehead as he convulsed in pain. "I have reasons to believe that Fowler has double-crossed us, as well as you! He's sending a nuke!"

"I... know..." Optimus said, "I heard." he spoke softly and sorrowfully. "I...I am disappointed...they were supposed to throw the switch...ugh...after we left. You...ugh...you can stop it. Your energon dna is different, and will not boil as fast...as ours... so it seems."

"Will you tell me where it is? Where this energy is coming from?" Kirsten begged him. "Please... you've been betrayed, there's nothing more to sacrifice!""Half...mile north...green thatched roof house. Banana tree blooming..." Optimus said, and Kirsten was on her way. Not without being followed though.

"Stop!" a jeep convoy yelled from behind her filled with three troops. Kirsten shook her head and lifted herself to her feet and trudged on. She felt them shooting at her back, it felt like small little mosquito bites to her armored skin. She jogged sloppily to the north, eventually making it to the small thatch roofed house with the blooming banana tree in front of it. The army escort kept reloading their guns and shooting her direction. She tore the roof off of the small house and there it was. A large generator with custom-designed wiring for air transfer, and a scientist who looked startled, went and hid. She frowned at the device, wondering how it worked, but didn't think twice about lifting her weapon, arming herself and then shooting a weak blast at it. But it was enough.

Metal shards flew into the air and smoke bellowed from the location that she was at. Optimus Prime and Megatron both saw the smoke from where they were. Slowly, the static charge went away, and they began to move. The drones and crew of the Decepticons and the Autobots both re-armed themselves as they realized that their mobility had returned, but Optimus Prime held his hands to his Autobots, telling them silently to freeze. Megatron lowered his weapon aimed at Optimus and their optics met with understanding.

Not far from where they were, a helicopter's buzz started. Optimus looked in the direction of the sound and immediately stopped the vehicle from taking off, the one that held Agent Fowler, a captain of the air force, and a few politicians. Optimus's face raged, and grabbed the helicopter by the tail and held it firmly, dragging it back to the ground.

"Fowler!" he said angrily.

The politicians and military officials looked scared and guilty, for they had gotten caught red-handed by the one that trusted them. What wrath would the mighty Optimus bestow upon them? The giant mech had been betrayed and only time would tell their fate.

* * *

Kirsten's demeanor had changed for the worst when she felt free to move again. She turned to the annoying human troops and growled at them, kicking the Jeep over on its side and stomping off back to the small battleground. "Leave me alone!" she said to one that kept shooting her in the leg, and she batted the gun forcefully out of his hand, sending it flying a few meters away.

As Kirsten returned to where the mech's stood, she only noticed the exchange of nods between Megatron and Optimus, unarmed, as a groundbridge opened up and the small army of Autobots entered, Optimus being the last, carrying a helicopter with him. And then it closed.

"I think this is a victory for all Cybertronians today..." Megatron said, powerfully, like a leader would. "A day for reconciliation, and reconsideration." Megatron addressed to all of his troops. "Autobots and Decepticons have come to an agreement..." Megatron shouted, and Cybertronians cheered. Kirsten looked around at the insignificant onlookers, the residents peering out from behind their closed doors, and from in the alleys. She secretly cheered for the Decepticons and also for mankind.

"Knock Out...we're ready." Megatron said, communicating back to the Nemisis. "Kirsten..." Megatron said as he noticed her presence.

Kirsten nodded and bowed to Megatron, "Lord Megatron, my services to the Decepticons may have also benefited the Autobots, but..." she thought bluntly, "but I assumed that to ensure the survival of the Decepticons, sacrifices would have to be made."

"You assumed wisely." Megatron said. "You could have very well let us all perish and then destroyed whatever it was that was conflicting us knowing that you were more immune to its effects to save yourself. And we all owe you a deal of gratitude." Megatron placed a strong and heavy hand on her shoulder and Kirsten looked up at him. He sounded like Optimus Prime as he spoke. Regally and majestically.

Suddenly, a drone spoke to Megatron internally from the ship.

"Sir, Knock Out will soon open a ground bridge, we have a lock on all of the Decepticons coordinates except Soundwave, we cannot find his signal."

"You can't find Soundwave?" Megatron asked.

Kirsten perked at his words. What?

Megatron looked down at Kirsten, who began to stand up. "Open the ground bridge, we'll send out a search and rescue." Megatron said back to him.

Kirsten felt Megatron's optics bore into her and pulled out the last of the hidden confidence that had been pent up somewhere in her soul. "Find him." He said to her.

* * *

She didn't need anymore explanation than that. Kirsten transformed and flew away from the capitol building as the groundbridge opened to bring back the Decepticons to the Nemesis. She had no idea where to look, but if she knew Soundwave's objective, probably somewhere electronic, and techy. She flew over the power grids and then over the banana fields towards the dam. She circled back again and tried to make lower, more observant swoops, but there was no luck where she went. He couldn't have been too far away, could he?

The last time that they couldn't find him, something awful had happened. Kirsten fought the feeling that something major had gone wrong with him, but she couldn't help but feel like something had.

After an hour, she still hadn't found him. She had one job to do right now and she sucked at it! She felt angry and afraid. She transformed and forcefully landed on the soil in the middle of some palm trees. A light breeze hit her face as she was close to the ocean and she was renewed by its feeling. She had to find him, but where else was there to look? She pounded the ground with her fists a few times and then looked up to the sky for an answer, anything. Please... she begged.

Her optics caught sight of a tiny farm house off in the distance with a small telephone pole by the side of it and connected with a strand of other cable towers that stretched back towards the city in a line.

She thought. A communications tower. She knew where to find him.

She flew as fast as she could, following the smaller towers back in towards the city and they eventually converged with others at one big communications tower. She circled the large tower once, looking for him, but only noticed the burnt metal at the top of the tower where the cables looked seared. She noticed small scratch marks on on of the sides which made her look down, and there was Soundwave, buried in the tall grasses that grew up and around the tower. She flew low and transformed, landing with panic and stumbling to his side.

"Soundwave, Soundwave!" she shouted to him, but he gave her no response. He was hot. When she placed her hands on his chest, she removed them because he was burning up from the inside. Her cheeks started to hurt and she tried her hardest not to freak out. Why was he so hot!? She then noticed a bulge from the side of his chest underneath his armor. Kirsten was quite sure that it wasn't normal for his body to bulge like that.

"Megatron, Megatron! Knock Out! Anyone!?" Kirsten yelled as she activated her communication link.

"Kirsten, what is it!?" Knock Out replied to her through the communication link, "Did you find Soundwave?"

"Yes! And he's hurt, he's hurt real bad! I think you need to tend to him!" Kirsten's vocalizer trembled as she spoke.

"How bad is he hurt? The ground bridge is being repaired from all the static that the crew brought through, and it overloaded. It shouldn't be long." He said with annoyance in his voice.

"Knock Out, he's unconscious! And like...he's bulging! And he's really hot!" Kirsten yelled back at him.

"Wait, you say he's bulging? Where?" Knock Out's voice suddenly carried a hint of concern.

"In his chest. On his left side." Kirsten wanted to scream at him to come help her.

"Shit." Knock Out said, which made Kirsten's energon skip a pulse. "Is it below his pectoral plates and above the serratus?

"What? I guess?" Kirsten replied, trying to think back to an anatomy class she once took.

"He's got internal thoracic hemorrhaging, and you say he's really hot?" Knock Out replied quickly.

"Yes, very...Knock Out, please he needs your help." Kirsten began to break down as she talked with him.

"Kirsten I...I can't get there right now, but there's something that you may be able to do." She heard him sigh and fidget with his thoughts. He obviously knew that something was wrong now.

"Anything! Just tell me what to do!" Kirsten said frantically looking Soundwave up and down.

"Okay, do you have something sharp? You need to act fast. Hopefully it's not too late already."

"Yes..."Kirsten said and readied her small wrist knife.

"Okay, Kirsten, there should be an anterior hydraulic cable left to the bulge in his plates, on Soundwave, it's grey, I need you to lift that cable okay, because if his energon has boiled to the point that it's started to coagulate in the hemorrhage then you need to bleed him to release the pressure, otherwise well...nevermind but just do exactly what I say."

Kirsten shook as she reached toward Soundwave's chest with her knife ready on her other hand. The cable was hot to the touch but she sucked it up and lifted it. "Okay, now what?" she said.

"Okay, aim your knife directly below where the cable was and it should hit a major artery. I have hopes that it's the one that has been damaged, so you need to cut that open..."

Kirsten's hand was burning from holding Soundwave's cable up but she aimed right where Knock Out said to, "Okay, I'm about to cut." she said.

"Let the fluid out and then hold the wound after it has drained until I can get there. That's all you can do.. It will bleed a lot..I'll be there as soon as I can, but do it quickly, the more he hemorrhages, the worse it will get and the lesser the chances of his survival."

Kirsten's bottom lip quivered as she put firm pressure on Soundwave's body with her knife, and felt the metal beneath her hand puncture and blue liquid began seeping from under her hand. He didn't move as she cut him, but she watched as the bulge in his chest slowly decreased in size. The energon bled for a few minutes and then when she felt like it was the right time, she put firm pressure on the wound to help stop the bleeding. She hung her head over him, hoping that he could feel her presence from his oblivion. The energon artery bled a lot, just like Knock Out said so her pressure increased almost to the point where she was almost putting her entire body weight into it. The only promising sign of her work was that his body temperature began to drop.

"Kirsten, what's happening?" Knock Out said in her communication link.

"He's getting cooler, the bulge is gone, but I'm not getting any response from him still."

"You wont.."Knock Out said back, "Not yet anyway."

"I'm scared for him, Knock Out, I hope I did everything right."

"You did." Knock Out tried to say comfortingly back to her, even though he knew the risks associated with what she did, but it was better than the alternative. "And being scared is appropriate."

Kirsten looked at Soundwave's blank visor, wishing there was some light, just, anything that would tell her that he would be okay. She didn't care that they weren't lovers anymore and she couldn't deny the feelings that were still present in her spark. Hopefully... that drive would be enough to save him.

Ten minutes passed, and the groundbridge opened at her location. She felt weak from putting so much pressure into stopping his bleeding and she looked at Knock Out, who exited the ground bridge with a medical kit in hand. He knelt by her and Kirsten removed himself from Soundwave's side. Knock Out got out a device and swiftly connected it to the place where Kirsten had placed her hand. An energon reservoir was the next device he pulled from his kit. He attached it to Soundwave's opposing arm from where the wound was.

Kirsten watched Knock Out's surefooted medical experience first hand and he worked fast.

"How...is he...?" Kirsten was afraid to ask, but did anyway.

Knock Out didn't answer her but kept working on Soundwave's chest plate, removing it and cleaning up the spilled energon and sealing it back up with lasers. He then got out a transfer device which encircled Soundwave's body in a glowing blue light and it lifted off of the ground. Knock Out picked up his kit and then began moving Soundwave's floating body towards the groundbridge until he pushed it through all the way and disappeared himself.

Kirsten stared at the glowing light for a little while longer until her body told her to move and she took the hardest steps she'd ever remember taking into the light, unsure and afraid of what to expect in the near future. Her energon beat heavy and slowly and she felt sick to her stomach but all she could do now was wait.

_:O dun dun duuuuuuun!_


	34. Cold and Broken

**AN: WOOOOO I LOVE ALL YOU LOYAL READERS! And welcome new readers! :) I am so happy to finally be continuing this, I know I left y'all on a nasty cliffhanger (which I love doing). **

**Just to make sure things go smoothly and clear in this chapter...and no one gets hopes of any of this: I don't do spark merging, I don't do telepathy, I just do the normal we're animals, they're animals kind of thing...makes it more challenging that way ;) But I've explained this before... just reiterating what you already know *kiss*. **

**Also...I'm really not into songfics, but I REALLY had to get into a mood to write this, so I chose one of the best songs I felt was appropriate for the situation... so if you really need to get into a mood while reading, go ahead and listen, or imagine to the song chosen that I've incorporated a few lyrics of (just for mood enhancement!) Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah. If you're like me and really hate it when someone ruins a fic with some lyrics you don't understand, then just skip the italics! Random... I love all of your faces! I wish I had more time for individual replies, and I'll try to do it for you all this time around! Reply, review and enjoy! 3 ~K**

Chapter 34: Cold and Broken

The Nemesis flew over the endless ocean, and it was in celebration. At least a semi-celebration.

"No doubt we are still at war until Cybertron is reclaimed, but while we are here on Earth," Megatron addressed his troops from the top of the bridge, "we shall seek to stay out of each other's way. We can start using our resources elsewhere, such as rebuilding our army, instead of swatting them away each time we take a step. Optimus has realized that these pesky little rats have tried to benefit themselves, and betrayed even him in the process." Megatron drew a thin smile from the corner of his mouth. "He shall fight for them no longer."

The ship erupted in cheers and chants, but Megatron held up his hands to hush them, "But that doesn't mean we are free to rest! We must rebuild quickly, and with our new-found technology," He glanced Kirsten's way, "We have hope of rebuilding a new world in our image."

Kirsten listened with integrity and nodded when Megatron addressed her next.

"A hybrid army." Megatron spoke softer and fluidly, "Made up of the very best that we can find, those that will be loyal and adventurous. Kirsten will continue to play ambassador without any need to worry about conflict from the Autobots and we will build, harvest, and build more!"

Kirsten crossed her arms and looked to the ground. 'With or without Soundwave?' she thought. It wasn't her celebration anyway, she hadn't been fighting a war for hundreds of thousands of years, she just wanted to know what he was going to be alright. Her spark ached and her knee joints felt weak and that sudden feeling of anxiety made chills run up her spine. She needed to lie down, so she slowly crept away from the gathering into her own chambers.

* * *

Three days had passed already and Soundwave still wasn't conscious. Every now and then, Kirsten would walk by Knock Out's medic bay to see if his door was open just so that she could take a peek in. But it was closed and locked. She would even hover in the corridor in front of his room and pace back and forth, wondering if Knock Out would open the door and she could at least talk him into letting her in. Which is what she was doing now. She switched directions and walked back the other way. She was fidgety and restless. Part of her was scared from the damage he had taken, and the other part of her was scared because of what she did to him.

Knock Out hadn't said a word to her since she returned on the ship. He would avoid her questions like the plague and the only response she had even a hint of, was overhearing him tell Megatron that 'there was more damage than I thought there would be' which didn't sound reassuring to Kirsten.

Kirsten leaned her back up against the wall opposing Knock Out's door and slid down the slick surface. Her butt plopped on the floor and she stared at the door. Her mind wandered while she stared. What would she do without Soundwave? How would she integrate with the others? One of the primary reasons she had agreed to becoming a hybrid was because of him, and what if she lost that entire reason...

(Shoop CLANG)

Kirsten's optics raised to the opened door. Knock Out sauntered to the frame and leaned against it, smugly, his silhouette looking unusual and stern above her.

"You've been doing this incessantly for three days." Knock Out said flatly, "Don't try to deny it, I've been watching you." He rolled his eyes at her. "Do you know how much time you're wasting?"

Kirsten slowly got to her feet and brushed her butt off, "Yeah." she said passively, "I know. I don't care."

"No, you DO care...too much." Knock Out said back, communicating to her that he understood her concern.

Kirsten looked at him with hopeful optics, daring to take a step forward. Knock Out just peered back at her, his red eyes glowing in the shadow of the light and his outlined body framed in a silver lining.

"Well are you coming in or not?" he sharply responded.

Kirsten followed him into his med bay and looked around. He had been working hard it looked like. His room, which was usually neat and organized, was strewn with equipment and parts. Drone pieces were placed here and there, and tubes that she had never seen before were hanging from various parts of his ceiling. He hovered in front of another closed door that she had never seen before, and he hesitated in front of it.

"I've been reluctant to let you in because..." he glanced back at her, "well, I didn't want you seeing him like this, in his current state." his finger twitched in front of the door's button.

Kirsten frowned, "Why wouldn't I want to at least see him?"

"It just, well, I guess I was afraid that it would be disturbing to you." Knock Out said slowly.

"What made you finally change your mind?" Kirsten said as the anxiety started to rise in her abdomen again.

"Megatron told me to." Knock Out said in response and pushed the button.

The door lifted and a dark gloom fell over the two of them as the light shifted. Purple light and red flickering lights filled the room, and a faint smell of burnt metal consumed the air. Kirsten gasped. On a single large plain table laid Soundwave's still and strewn body. His indigo lines that usually shone bright and fiercely were nothing more than a dim glow, and his beaten and bruised body lay in sections, his chest torn open and interrupted by lighted tubes and pumps injecting liquid directly into his cabled veins.

Kirsten couldn't move. Her spark's beat went arrhythmic and she began to feel a familiar emotional stress overtake her processor. Her human reaction was to cover her mouth and weep, but her Cybertronian limitations didn't allow her to weep nor was there any reason to cover her mouth for intake of air, so she just stood and stared at the mess in front of her. His chest, uninhibited by the absence of Laserbeak, emitted a faint blue light as it had been temporarily propped open by all of the equipment. His chest was also strewn across the surface of the table, the right side of him was in pieces.

"I tried to stop the damage before it got to his processor," Knock Out heaved a heavy vent.

Kirsten took a few steps closer, expecting Knock Out to stop her, but he didn't. She looked at Soundwave closer and found that the right side of his helm had been removed, the same side of his thoracic damage.

"And...what I did..." Kirsten fidgeted with her hands while she spoke, releasing some nervous energy, "Did it help at all?" They were meek words, unsure, and heavy with tension.

"What you did might have saved his processor. Anymore pressure and it would have provoked an aneurysm inside his head which would have probably ruptured and caused..." Knock Out almost looked nervous himself as he stared at the large mech on the table, "massive failure." Knock Out felt for Kirsten, but he didn't know what to say. It wasn't characteristic of any of the Decepticons to see or stay by one fallen.

"So...is he.." Kirsten questioned.

"He's in a state of neuro-stasis, more commonly known to you as a coma." Knock Out said while tucking his arms together in front of him, "I need his processor to become more active to speed up the healing and repair process that I'm trying to necessitate in his body, otherwise he'll just keep revoking the energon transfusions I'm giving him. And I can't start a full repair until his energon levels are stable." Knock Out shook his head.

"So...he'll be okay?" Kirsten gave herself a false sense of security by hoping that he would say yes, but he only shook his head again.

"Can't say." Knock Out shrugged, "I've tried my electro-magnetic shocker at full power and still, nothing."

Kirsten walked as close as she could get to Soundwave and knelt on the floor on his left side and put a delicate hand on his bladed arm. She closed her eyes and just leaned against him and the table. Wishing there was something more that she could do, she mindlessly squeezed his arm as if it were to awaken whatever it was that was sleeping inside of him.

Knock Out began to leave the room, leaving her and Soundwave to themselves. He kept the door open between the two rooms to keep an eye out if anything changed. Besides, he had done all he could do, what would it hurt if she visited him for a while?

* * *

….

_I've heard there was a secret chord  
That David played, and it pleased the Lord  
But you don't really care for music, do you?  
It goes like this  
The fourth, the fifth  
The minor fall, the major lift  
The baffled king composing Hallelujah_

Hallelujah...

_Your faith was strong but you needed proof  
You saw her bathing on the roof  
Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you  
She tied you to a kitchen chair  
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair  
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah..._

_Hallelujah..._

Kirsten stayed by his side for hours it seemed like. She didn't want to do anything else, and no one seemed to object. The same thoughts kept rolling through her mind without resolution. What would happen if things took a turn for the worse? What if she had found him sooner? What if later? What if she hadn't had made any connection with Costa Rica? What if she had never said yes...

She couldn't help but think it was all somehow her fault, when in reality she knew it wasn't, but the possibility kept returning to her head as some sort of grieving tension that seemed to punish her mind more and more. She dipped her head down into the crevice of his arm on his side and placed her forehead against the cold metal.

"You know, when I met you, I couldn't wait to eventually hear you say something, anything." she spoke softly and delicately, her words warm with truth, "...and now I feel myself longing for the same thing, but this time...just..anything." She looked up from her kneeled position to notice his visor, hoping she'd find some light, but there was just darkness. "I've never wanted you hear you more than now..." Her eyes darted from his visor to his open chest and back again before she lowered her head back into his arm's crevice.

"Please don't leave me," she whispered into his arm, "I still love you." She grit her teeth and clenched her optics shut, "I always will." The heat from her body warmed his arm, transferring small amounts of warmth to the area she covered, it made him seem better when she could feel the heat resonating, but it would soon disappear if she backed away too much.

She stayed for just a few minutes longer and then struggled to her feet. Shaky legs carried her heavy soul out of the room and Knock Out greeted her as she turned to leave. He placed a hand on her shoulder and she fell into his chest, as she had done once before, but this time, it was in mourning over her beloved. She covered her face with her hands and Knock Out wrapped her in an embrace.

"If Soundwave knew how lucky he was to have someone who cared for him this much," Knock Out started to say into her helm, "He'd be bouncing off that table in a nanosecond." but then Knock Out shrugged off the downed feeling that he was giving into, even though he shared Kirsten's sympathies, "But then, he's always been dense like that..." He looked aimlessly into the air and huffed. Slowly, Kirsten let Knock Out slip out of her grasp and she nearly crawled out of the room without another word, closing the door behind her.

* * *

_Baby I have been here before  
I know this room, I've walked this floor  
I used to live alone before I knew you.  
I've seen your flag on the marble arch  
Love is not a victory march  
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah..._

Hallelujah...

…_.Hallelujah_

_Hallelujah..._

_...Hallelujah_

_Maybe there's a God above  
But all I've ever learned from love  
Was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you  
It's not a cry you can hear at night  
It's not somebody who has seen the light  
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah_

Hallelujah, Hallelujah...

'Where is this room...where is this?' Soundwave's mind was lost in the far reaches of oblivion.

_Hallelujah..._

'Something seems wrong,' His processor sparked but wasn't good enough, he stayed in oblivion. 'I feel, cold.' he thought, and he was in darkness. He was fatigued, and he was tired, he just wanted to give up. Soundwave's mind wandered deeper into the reaches of the unknown and beyond, it became harder to feel the surging sparks that kept prodding at him. 'No, not now...' Soundwave thought, 'I'm too tired.' And then the sparks eventually stopped.

Darkness felt lonely, but he was too tired to think anymore. He became confused and there was no light to guide him, he couldn't find where he had just come from. 'There's something wrong.' He thought again.

And then it became cold, really cold. Soundwave became scared and a tremor shook his processor into one final rush of adrenaline, and he could swear he could hear bells. 'Where are those coming from?' he wondered, but he couldn't find his way back, it was too dark, and he was tired. But the bells continued, they were persistent. 'Okay fine...' Soundwave thought and searched for the bells. But he couldn't see them, he could only hear them. He tried to see them, but he was stuck in darkness, he started to fatigue again. Then the bells shifted, and they began to sound more organized, like words, but there were no words. He became confused, 'Why would bells become words?' Nothing was making sense, he was so tired of searching now, his weary mind began to tune out the incomprehensible words, until he sensed the warmth.

His interrupted cold slumber was different. 'Why are things changing?' He could only think simply. The bell-voice eventually stopped, and he found himself wanting to reach for it, feeling closer than before. He followed in his mind where he thought the bells had been coming from so that he could figure out why it was so confusing and the closer he got, the warmer it became. The darkness became crisper, and he wanted the bells so bad! The bells that were like a voice, and the voice that was so warm! Something in his processor sparked suddenly, and he knew who's voice he was trying to reach for.

Knock Out finished a small weld on a biomechanic and set it aside. It hadn't been long since Kirsten left the room and she had left him with a less-than-optimistic mood. He sighed and picked up the next biomechanic but a strange noise from the adjoining room startled him, causing him to drop his piece.

"K—k kkk- k-"

Knock Out snapped his head around towards Soundwave's room.

"K—k-kk-k"

Knock Out bolted up and jogged to Soundwave's side and swiftly removed his visor. Soundwave's mouth was chattering and his optics were squeezed shut.

"Soundwave! Okay comrade hang on..." Knock Out scanned his processor levels, they were stronger than before, he was trying to come back. "Calm down okay, I've got you."

Soundwave's left arm raised about 4 degrees and then stopped, "K—k-" he kept repeating.

"I know, I know!" Knock Out said, knowing exactly what he was trying to say and who exactly he wanted. Unfortunately she had already left the room and Knock Out needed to work fast while Soundwave's body tried to come back to active status. "Just be patient!" Knock Out raised the energy levels and flow of the energon transfusion as Soundwave's body began accepting it.

Knock Out closed his chest immediately after he was done to prevent infection and began another transfusion through a cable in his arm. Soundwave's body seemed to be taking it and not rejecting it, which made all of Knock Out's major worry finally go away. He could work with this. He was relieved that Soundwave was finally turning around, he had tried everything, and he wondered what exactly had happened in the short amount of time that he had shocked him to now, and what might have transpired in between. It didn't matter, all he needed to do now was focus on his repair, and let the others know once he got him stable.

Soundwave's body was still tense though, his arm raised, mouth chattering, and optics shut. Knock Out couldn't remember the last time he heard a real sound come from his mouth. He had fathomed such, but to actually hear the sounds being released from his vocalizer was amazing. With him being as gone as he was coupled with his lack of speech over the past thousand years, Knock Out wondered whether or not his non-lexical speech was a result of his injury or totally normal.

Soundwave became tenser the more that his body began to return to consciousness, this, Knock Out didn't like. Soundwave's hydraulic muscles wanted to move and he wanted to wake, but it was hard to coordinate his processor with his body and Knock Out ended up trying to hold him still rather than administer healing. He had to give him a relaxing agent, and fast. He swiftly grabbed his tranquilizer and shot him deeply in the stomach.

Immediately Soundwave stopped twitching and fell slowly still again, but this time, with conscious mind and sound body. Knock Out heaved a huge vent and threw the tranquilizer on the hard ground.

"Alright comrade, let's get to work...it's gonna be a long recovery." Knock Out said.


End file.
